Connecting a LACIE hard drive turns off Wi-Fi

[MBruce]

Hi,

When I connect my hard drive LACIE via USB port to my MacBook Pro 13" (2012) OSX 10.8.4, Airport disconnects from my home WiFi and tries to find another available network... And when I click on my home WiFi, it says "Time expired" and keeps on trying to find another WiFi connection.

But, when I disconnect the hard drive after ejecting it, Airport automatically reconnects to my usual WiFi and everything works as nothing happened...

I tried several times, I reconnected the hard drive and Airport disconnects every time. I tried to connect the hard drive to the 2 different USB port, but still the same issue. I actually have access to the hard drive, but I can't go on the internet when it's plugged in my MacBook pro.

The hard drive is clean, I only use it for stocking my Photoshop works, such as big images files and .PSD files.

That'd be so great if you had a solution to this problem which seems to be not that frequent because I didn't find anything about this issue...

Thank you !

(Sorry if my english isn't that good. I speak french. Hopefully you'll understand what my issue is...)

EDIT: Btw, I just tried to plug in my iTouch 4, a phone and 2 Canon cameras on both USB ports and Airport does not turn off, so the hard drive really is the issue...

EDIT2: It's a "LACIE rugged mini 500Gb USB 3.0 5400 rpm" with that orange thing...

 

[RadDave]

Hi MBruce - don't believe that I have an answer, but that is certainly weird behavior - own the LaCie external USB 3.0 SSD below for backup of my r-MBP (bought end of March this year & running same OS myself) - just plugged it in and no problem maintaing a Wi-Fi internet connection (on an Airport Extreme router).

I cannot imagine why a mechanical HD would disable your computer's Wi-Fi - have you plugged the LaCie into another computer w/ the same effect? Do you have the password protection enabled? If so, does disabling the feature make a difference? Well, I can't add much more but please post back if you find a solution! Dave

 

[MBruce]

Hi RadDave,

I've been using my LACIE hard drive for almost 5 months, with no problem at all, so it's even more weird because I've never had any issue with it... I find it weird too that a hard drive can disable my Wi-Fi connection.

I have not plugged the LACIE hard drive into another computer, always used it with my MBPro.

But, what do you mean by password protection? If you mean that I might have a password protection when I connect the hard drive to the computer, then no I do not have one. I mean, I just plug in the hard drive, wait for my computer to detect it and start to work with it. No password ever.

Yeah sure if I find a solution, I'll definitely post it. But I'm having a hard time to find ideas to know where this is coming from and why it's happening. I really hope someone will be able to help me with this! It's really annoying...

Thanks for answering tho' !

 

[MBruce]

Ok so good news everything works together again... but I don't know why...

I just replugged in the hard drive and restarted my computer for the 100th time, and it all worked.

Everything seems to be fine now. Even restarted the computer to see if it would work, it did. I'm currently working with it.

I guess I'll never know why I had this issue. Hopefully I won't have to come back here!

Thanks anyway.

 

[RadDave]

Hi again MBruce - first, glad that the drive started to work again (for whatever reason ), and hope that all will be well in the future.

Concerning the password (PW) issue, I had been reading about that particular drive on Amazon and seems that you can protect your files w/ a built-in PW program on the drive - just wondering if you had activated that feature & if that could be an issue? Dave

 

[LaCieTech]

One of our drives disabling Airport wireless is not a behavior we have seen here at LaCie either. I doubt you would see the same behavior if you connected it to another laptop. If it was reproducible on another computer I would have to say there is some sort of short either in the cable or within the drive itself. But those type of Hardware issues don't tend to come and go. If you continue to have issues consider contacting LaCie Technical Support here. ~TE

https://www.lacie.com/us/mystuff/login.htm?rtn=mystuff

Hi RadDave,

I've been using my LACIE hard drive for almost 5 months, with no problem at all, so it's even more weird because I've never had any issue with it... I find it weird too that a hard drive can disable my Wi-Fi connection.

I have not plugged the LACIE hard drive into another computer, always used it with my MBPro.

But, what do you mean by password protection? If you mean that I might have a password protection when I connect the hard drive to the computer, then no I do not have one. I mean, I just plug in the hard drive, wait for my computer to detect it and start to work with it. No password ever.

Yeah sure if I find a solution, I'll definitely post it. But I'm having a hard time to find ideas to know where this is coming from and why it's happening. I really hope someone will be able to help me with this! It's really annoying...

Thanks for answering tho' !

 

[dan-s]

Same issue with cheap Sabrent HD enclosure

I have exactly the same issue with a cheap Sabrent external (usb 3.0) HD enclosure. I also have an issue where it periodically disconnects from my computer.

Having said that, I'm pretty sure that there is a wiring fault in the enclosure that is causing connectivity issues. It seems likely that the fault may also be shorting out the wifi antenna or something similar. Especially since the case of the mac is metal...

 

[Richdmoore]

There are a few articled when I googled it talking about interference between USB 3.0 & Wifi.

http://www.macobserver.com/tmo/article/usb-3.0-hard-drives-can-cause-wi-fi-interference

I would try to replace the USB cable, and move the drive either closer or further away to see if you can minimize or eliminate the interference.