USB 3.x PCIe Cards for Classic Mac Pro

[ActionableMango]

I need a card that will provide out of box USB 3.0 support without ejecting drives when Mac Pro is in sleep running High Sierra.

From Sonnet:

"To minimize power usage during sleep, power is removed from PCIe cards. Because of this power-saving specification, a USB 2.0, 3.0, or 3.1 PCIe card is unable to maintain USB port power during sleep. In macOS, this result in a storage device disconnect upon wake from sleep. The storage device will automatically remount, but the system reports a disconnect message. Because macOS flushes all caches before sleeping, this disconnect should never result in any loss of data."​

I don't see how any card could get around not having power.

What is your specific issue? Perhaps it can be worked around in some other way. For example if you just don't like the disconnection messages, there was software mentioned in this thread that prevents those. "Jettison" I think.

 

[zero hectic]

Does anyone have any experience with the NewerTech MAXPower USB 3.1 Gen1 – 4 Port PCIe card? I'm currently using the Inateck KT4004 in my Mac Pro 5,1 and was wondering if it's worth the swap.

 

[howiest]

Does anyone have any experience with the NewerTech MAXPower USB 3.1 Gen1 – 4 Port PCIe card? I'm currently using the Inateck KT4004 in my Mac Pro 5,1 and was wondering if it's worth the swap.

I had to remove that card after updating to Sierra a year and a half ago, the driver caused a kernel panic at startup. I believe there is a driverless version of that NewerTech card, which I regret not buying.
I've been using a NewerTech eSATA card ever since, no driver required and no problems.

 

[ActionableMango]

Does anyone have any experience with the NewerTech MAXPower USB 3.1 Gen1 – 4 Port PCIe card? I'm currently using the Inateck KT4004 in my Mac Pro 5,1 and was wondering if it's worth the swap.

That NewerTech USB "3.1" card is a USB 3.0 card using the exact same USB 3.0 FL1100EX chipset that your KT4004 does, has the same top speed, the same wattage per port, the same number of ports, and the same types of USB connectors.

So unless your current card is defective, I'm not sure what you think you'll get from swapping.

 

[Mattww]

From Sonnet:

"To minimize power usage during sleep, power is removed from PCIe cards. Because of this power-saving specification, a USB 2.0, 3.0, or 3.1 PCIe card is unable to maintain USB port power during sleep. In macOS, this result in a storage device disconnect upon wake from sleep. The storage device will automatically remount, but the system reports a disconnect message. Because macOS flushes all caches before sleeping, this disconnect should never result in any loss of data."​

I don't see how any card could get around not having power.

What is your specific issue? Perhaps it can be worked around in some other way. For example if you just don't like the disconnection messages, there was software mentioned in this thread that prevents those. "Jettison" I think.

Although I've had an Inateck PCI-E USB 3.0 card in my own 2009 cMP for a few years now I've actually only used it for extra ports to connect my Logitech Web Camera and Steering wheel because I had kept using the eSATA card and drive dock I already had for my removable storage and regular clones. My other backup with Time Machine has been going onto an internal disk which worked well.

I finally however picked up a WD USB 3 external 8TB disk the other day because my internal disk (6TB) was full and the size of the backup really has outgrown it - the external drive was so much cheaper than a bare internal drive.

I'd read about this sleep eject issue before but at the time it seemed like it was a software issue so it is interesting to hear Sonnet say it is down to how the hardware is managed when entering sleep.

I'm not sure what to do now, as I always use sleep each day when not using my Mac. It's not like the cMP power use when idling is negligible either!

I guess I could ignore the messages and hope no data gets corrupted, try the Jettison software and see how it gets on with my other devices and hope it keeps up with an early adaptor of software updates and new OS releases, or risk voiding the warranty and getting the disk out of the enclosure assume it has a SATA connector in there, although I did like the idea of getting an internal drive bay back for more space there as well.

Sounds like sleep and external USB drives is an issue for new Macs as well, I'm not sure how they expect folks to deal with multi TB data sets which aren't getting any smaller. Even over eSATA or USB it is going on for a day to restart my Time Machine backups fresh, having disks in a cupboard in a NAS sounded really cool but would be so much slower, and even if I could afford to keep paying for cloud storage that would be worse still...

 

[ActionableMango]

Sounds like sleep and external USB drives is an issue for new Macs as well, I'm not sure how they expect folks to deal with multi TB data sets which aren't getting any smaller.

I think you are making too much of this. When sleep is invoked, it's not like power is immediately lost and your data is corrupted if you were in middle of a disk write. Invoking sleep triggers a formal process which includes all disk writes being finished before sleep is started.

Even if sleep is forced somehow before all disk writes are completed, which shouldn't happen, you still shouldn't have corruption. Assuming you are using a Journaled file system like the default HFS+, the possibility of corruption is extremely low because changes are not committed to the directory until the changes are complete.

 

[Mattww]

OK - good to hear, I know the OS will normally wait to sleep with Time Machine running and even if you select sleep whilst Time Machine is running the OS stops/pauses the processes first so I guess if the drive is for backup only I can ignore the warning messages on wake.

 

[JaySCT]

Currently have the Inateck KT 4004.. Have been on El Capitan for a while on Mac Book 5,1 (2010). Upgraded to Sierra (can't go to High Sierra because of lack of RAID 0 boot - Sonnet Tempo Pro Plus is not bootable) and now when system goes to sleep, any drives that are connected to Inateck come back with a improper ejection message, but reconnect in a few seconds. Notice that the Inateck card formal OS support is a few generations older. Looking at the Sonnet 4 port Pro card(says Sierra supported), but looking for suggestions as to other possible "fixes" on the Inateck. Tried all the standard NVRAM, etc., restarts.. Thanks!

 

[h9826790]

Currently have the Inateck KT 4004.. Have been on El Capitan for a while on Mac Book 5,1 (2010). Upgraded to Sierra (can't go to High Sierra because of lack of RAID 0 boot - Sonnet Tempo Pro Plus is not bootable) and now when system goes to sleep, any drives that are connected to Inateck come back with a improper ejection message, but reconnect in a few seconds. Notice that the Inateck card formal OS support is a few generations older. Looking at the Sonnet 4 port Pro card(says Sierra supported), but looking for suggestions as to other possible "fixes" on the Inateck. Tried all the standard NVRAM, etc., restarts.. Thanks!

OP just answered that in post #1926

https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...classic-mac-pro.1501482/page-78#post-25565106

"Jettison" is the work around

 

[JaySCT]

OP just answered that in post #1926

https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...classic-mac-pro.1501482/page-78#post-25565106

"Jettison" is the work around

Yes, saw that, but looking for ANYTHING, that will keep them from disconnecting.. According to that Sonnet message, that doesn't sound possible. Mine reconnect on wake so not an issue I can think of (other than the annoying message!).

 

[eyeangle]

I just bought this:

Front

Back

The installation was pretty straight forward, it didn't come with any driver discs. But I did noticed how close the ports were to the edge of the mac, have a look. I don't have any USB 3.1 devices to try right now but it looks like it's going to be a tight fit. I don't even know if I'll be able to get them in it's so close.

If only they put the ports in the centre of the back... Will post back when I've tested it out.

 

[tu2thepoo]

I just bought this:

Front

Back

The installation was pretty straight forward, it didn't come with any driver discs. But I did noticed how close the ports were to the edge of the mac, have a look. I don't have any USB 3.1 devices to try right now but it looks like it's going to be a tight fit. I don't even know if I'll be able to get them in it's so close.

If only they put the ports in the centre of the back... Will post back when I've tested it out.

If it makes you feel better, it's a pretty tight fit but my type-C cable works fine:

I also had the card in slots 3 and 4 and was able to plug the cable in without issues.

 

[eyeangle]

If it makes you feel better, it's a pretty tight fit but my type-C cable works fine:
View attachment 746275
I also had the card in slots 3 and 4 and was able to plug the cable in without issues.

Awesome! Thanks for showing me that. It does make me feel better.

 

[zcream]

The prices for Highpoint 114C and 114D on the first post are listed as 70-80$ - but the lowest I can find is 120$. Could someone kindly point me to the 70$ listing ?

 

[crjackson2134]

The prices for Highpoint 114C and 114D on the first post are listed as 70-80$ - but the lowest I can find is 120$. Could someone kindly point me to the 70$ listing ?

You should consider that prices do go up. If you search a little harder, you’ll likely be able to find them for less. Here’s one such example from newegg. $101.00

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod...83&cm_re=rocketu_1144d-_-16-115-183-_-Product

 

[nigelbb]

The prices for Highpoint 114C and 114D on the first post are listed as 70-80$ - but the lowest I can find is 120$. Could someone kindly point me to the 70$ listing ?

Prices vary over time. I bought a Highpoint 1144C from amazon.com for $67.99 on May 12, 2015 but when I bought another just a couple of weeks later on May 28, 2015 it cost $86.52. Now the 1144D costs $101.04 but if I was buying again I would be totally happy as it's a great card & worth the money. https://www.amazon.com/HighPoint-4-Port-PCI-Express-RocketU-1144D/dp/B015CQ8DCS/ref=dp_ob_title_ce

BTW It's not my exceptional memory that allows me to recall purchases from over 2.5 years ago but Amazon's detailed record of my purchase history which is almost creepy/,

 

[MIKX]

I haven't seen any/many posts about the Inateck 4 port
KTU3FR-4P
https://www.inateck.com/inateck-ktu3fr-4p-usb-3-0-pci-express-karte-mit-4-usb-3-0-ports.html

This works out of the box in my Mavericks. Yosemite. Sierra & Hi Sierra instals and as long as an HDD is connected to my external USB 3.0 HDD adaptor ( ASM 1051 powered ) at boot time there are no issues with HDDs disconnecting after sleep. I suspect that also if the external HDD dock is "ON" at boot time - there will be no disconnect problems but haven't really tested that yet.

I run it powered from an unused SATA bus.

Great card.

 

[h9826790]

View attachment 746676

I haven't seen any/many posts about the Inateck 4 port https://www.inateck.com/inateck-ktu3fr-4p-usb-3-0-pci-express-karte-mit-4-usb-3-0-ports.html

This works out of the box in my Mavericks. Yosemite. Sierra & Hi Sierra instals and as long as an HDD is connected to my external USB 3.0 HDD adaptor ( ASM 1051 powered ) at boot time there are no issues with HDDs disconnecting after sleep. I suspect that also if the external HDD dock is "ON" at boot time - there will be no disconnect problems but haven't really tested that yet.

I run it powered from an unused SATA bus.

Great card.

Most likely because there is a “build for Mac” KT4004 from Inateck, therefore, if looking for Inateck card, most users simply buy the KT4004 which doesn’t need extra power.

 

[ActionableMango]

at boot time there are no issues with HDDs disconnecting after sleep

Not sure how to make sense of this. Do you mean at "wake" time? Because boot time is not what follows after sleep.

 

[MIKX]

Not sure how to make sense of this. Do you mean at "wake" time? Because boot time is not what follows after sleep.

If at "cold startup" time a drive is in the external USB 3.0 dock .. then drives do not disconnect regardless of whether the cMP sleeps or not.

EDIT : The model No. is
KTU3FR-4P

 

[ActionableMango]

Yes, saw that, but looking for ANYTHING, that will keep them from disconnecting.. According to that Sonnet message, that doesn't sound possible. Mine reconnect on wake so not an issue I can think of (other than the annoying message!).

Mikx says his doesn't disconnect. See post above.

 

[krakman]

Mikx says his doesn't disconnect. See post above.

From what I have read the disconnection issue is caused by the PCI slot/card not supplying SIGNAL/POWER to an external hard drive over USB3 when the Mac goes to Sleep.

MIKX card has a SATA power connector on it to draw power from elsewhere in the Mac Pro so the card still has power when MAC goes to sleep.

Most "Made for Mac" PCI USB3 cards draw all their power from the PCI Slot and are at the mercy of the pre programmed power management features of the computer which cause the "drive not disconnected properly" errors.

 

[crjackson2134]

which cause the "drive not disconnected properly" notifications .

If there were a way to simply disable the notifications for that function, it would be a non-issue

 

[Susurs]

Tried ORICO PA31-AC (ASM1142 chip) with macOS 10.12, showed x2 lane width.

So does ORICO PA31-AC work correctly in mac pro?
[doublepost=1518432236][/doublepost]P.S. Do this kind of cards require to be connected to additional power?

 

[zcream]

Right, I have a cheaper version of this card. But it does not seem to connect any HDD.

Testing the new macOS Sierra, noticed that my Orico PVU3-4P-R2.0 with VLI VL805 controller is now supported by AppleUSBXHCIPCI.

Works with AppleUSBXHCIPCI natively, no more generic XHCI and disabling SIP.

[doublepost=1518906406][/doublepost]The HDD does not show up in Disk Utility or Finder, also the PCI window shows an error.