Why is WD My Passport disconnecting itself?

[Eagle 20]

So I purchased a WD 2TB My Passport mid-February and it worked great at first. Then about two months later it began disconnecting itself from my Mac. I contacted WD Support and a manager said I would be sent a brand new drive with 90-days extension to the (3-year) warranty. Long story short, I received a refurbished drive the end of May, and then supposedly a new drive the beginning of July.

Shortly after receiving the second replacement I attempted to use it, but as soon as it was formatted it began disconnecting itself from my Mac. WD Support was contacted but are no longer responding. In the meantime, I have been awaiting a return label for the first (refurb) replacement, and had not used it. Tonight I decided to give it a try, but the same thing happened.

Someone said this is a problem with my Mac which is manifesting via the drive(s). Admittedly, this makes no sense to me because I am not experiencing any other issues with my Mac, or my old external hard drive that the My Passport was purchased to replace. But it also makes no sense that my original My Passport began repeatedly disconnecting itself after two months of use, and two replacements began doing the same almost immediately.

That said, when I have searched online I have found quite a few complaints concerning this same issue with the WD My Passport from both Mac and Windows users. Unfortunately, none of these have pointed to a cause or resolution. But I would like to see if I can get one working since I am SOL when it comes to getting my money back and WD Support abandoned me

Any ideas what could cause these WD drives to disconnect themselves?

 

[maplingstorie]

not enough power supply maybe? What MacBook Pro are you using?

 

[Fishrrman]

Does the drive have a removable USB cable?
If so, have you tried substituting ANOTHER cable?
Sometimes, that makes a difference (but not always).

Some drives will spin down after a period of activity. This may be due to something in the drive's own controller, or perhaps how it's interacting with the OS. Do you have the "put hard disks to sleep when possible" UNchecked (energy saver control panel)?

There are some small free utilities out there that will try to "keep a drive alive" by keeping it spinning all the time. Here's one:

Free keep drive spinning for mac download (macOS)

Free keep drive spinning for mac download. System Tools downloads - Keep Drive Spinning by Jon Stovell and many more programs are available...

en.freedownloadmanager.org

 

[BigMcGuire]

The failures from these external drives are going way up these days as consumers shift from $100-$150 external drives to "cloud" storage. Reviews on Amazon and other sites show these increased error rates.

My wife and I bought several WD Passport drives and one of them has already died.
Our work usually purchases these for developer on-site backups. The failure rate is way too high.

That said, Fishrrman is right - you sure the drive just isn't spinning down? These drives now days LOVE to spin down after minutes of inactivity and can take a lot of time to "spin back up" and be accessible in finder. It is annoying especially when you can hear it spin up and down all the time.

 

[LIVEFRMNYC]

Because it's WD, that's why. I've had poor luck with WD external drives and WD NAS drives.

 

[BigMcGuire]

Because it's WD, that's why. I've had poor luck with WD external drives and WD NAS drives.

WD used to be great, but in the last handful of years, the quality has really gone down hill for me too.

 

[Eagle 20]

not enough power supply maybe? What MacBook Pro are you using?

It should have enough power. I have a MacBook Pro (Retina, 13-inch, Early 2015) with macOS Catalina (10.15.6).

Does the drive have a removable USB cable?
If so, have you tried substituting ANOTHER cable?
Sometimes, that makes a difference (but not always).

Some drives will spin down after a period of activity. This may be due to something in the drive's own controller, or perhaps how it's interacting with the OS. Do you have the "put hard disks to sleep when possible" UNchecked (energy saver control panel)?

There are some small free utilities out there that will try to "keep a drive alive" by keeping it spinning all the time. Here's one:

Free keep drive spinning for mac download (macOS)

Free keep drive spinning for mac download. System Tools downloads - Keep Drive Spinning by Jon Stovell and many more programs are available...

en.freedownloadmanager.org

The USB is removable, but I do not have another like it. And yes, the "put hard disks to sleep.." is unchecked.

The failures from these external drives are going way up these days as consumers shift from $100-$150 external drives to "cloud" storage. Reviews on Amazon and other sites show these increased error rates.

My wife and I bought several WD Passport drives and one of them has already died.
Our work usually purchases these for developer on-site backups. The failure rate is way too high.

That said, Fishrrman is right - you sure the drive just isn't spinning down? These drives now days LOVE to spin down after minutes of inactivity and can take a lot of time to "spin back up" and be accessible in finder. It is annoying especially when you can hear it spin up and down all the time.

When the drive(s) disconnect there is no rhyme or reason to it. For instance, the second replacement I received began disconnecting itself within seconds of being formatted and in a span of one hour I received twenty-four notifications that said "Disk not ejected properly". The thing is, once this issue begins the only thing which I have found that corrects it is erasing and formatting it again. But the longest one has worked properly is two days, if that long.

Because it's WD, that's why. I've had poor luck with WD external drives and WD NAS drives.

WD used to be great, but in the last handful of years, the quality has really gone down hill for me too.

This was my first and last time buying a WD product, which is just based on my experience with their so-called support. I have dealt with some bad ones in my day, but WD Support is definitely in the top three worst.


On another note, I discovered something else that seems odd about the issue I have been experiencing. If I eject the disk from within finder or Disk Utility but leave the drive plugged in it will mount itself only to begin disconnecting itself over and over again.

BUT... (long story short) A few days ago I ended up chatting with Amazon Support who said as an exception, they would allow me to return the replacement I received from WD for a refund. So I sent it yesterday and received a refund within a few hours of UPS scanning the return since it went to my gift card balance. Now I can just buy a new drive, but I have no idea what to get

 

[Fishrrman]

"Now I can just buy a new drive, but I have no idea what to get"

What are your "size requirements"?
2tb (or less)?
Or... "more"...?

Will the drive be used for general storage?
Or... a "backup drive only"?

If you could get away with 1tb, I'd suggest a 1tb 2.5" SATA SSD.
Then, put it into an external enclosure, like this:

SABRENT 2.5 Inch SATA to USB 3.0 Tool Free External Hard Drive Enclosure [Optimized for SSD, Support UASP SATA III] Black (EC-UASP)

SABRENT 2.5 Inch SATA to USB 3.0 Tool Free External Hard Drive Enclosure [Optimized for SSD, Support UASP SATA III] Black (EC-UASP)

tinyurl.com

(the drive just drops in and the enclosure snaps together, you don't even need tools)

You could also get a 2tb SSD, but these seem to be running $200 for a bare drive.

Perhaps 2 1tb drives would do.

IF it's backup only, I'd suggest looking for 2.5" form factor platter-based HDDs.
Be aware that they come in different drive speeds, such as 5400rpm (on the slow side) or 7200rpm.
Drive speed matters "less" for backup, because you're not really accessing the drive much, and because once the initial backup is done (takes a while), later "incremental" backups go much more quickly.

Again, you could use an enclosure like the one mentioned above.

One other thought:
If you're going to use an external drive for "primary storage" -- that is, stuff that is stored ONLY on the external drive, and not on the internal drive -- you're going to have to keep the external drive backed up, too.
What that really means is a SECOND external drive to serve as a backup.
A little more expense, and more to "keep track of", but if you want to keep your data protected, you have to do, what you have to do...

 

[Eagle 20]

What are your "size requirements"?
2tb (or less)?
Or... "more"...?

Will the drive be used for general storage?
Or... a "backup drive only"?

If you could get away with 1tb, I'd suggest a 1tb 2.5" SATA SSD.
Then, put it into an external enclosure, like this:

SABRENT 2.5 Inch SATA to USB 3.0 Tool Free External Hard Drive Enclosure [Optimized for SSD, Support UASP SATA III] Black (EC-UASP)

SABRENT 2.5 Inch SATA to USB 3.0 Tool Free External Hard Drive Enclosure [Optimized for SSD, Support UASP SATA III] Black (EC-UASP)

tinyurl.com

(the drive just drops in and the enclosure snaps together, you don't even need tools)

You could also get a 2tb SSD, but these seem to be running $200 for a bare drive.

Perhaps 2 1tb drives would do.

IF it's backup only, I'd suggest looking for 2.5" form factor platter-based HDDs.
Be aware that they come in different drive speeds, such as 5400rpm (on the slow side) or 7200rpm.
Drive speed matters "less" for backup, because you're not really accessing the drive much, and because once the initial backup is done (takes a while), later "incremental" backups go much more quickly.

Again, you could use an enclosure like the one mentioned above.

One other thought:
If you're going to use an external drive for "primary storage" -- that is, stuff that is stored ONLY on the external drive, and not on the internal drive -- you're going to have to keep the external drive backed up, too.
What that really means is a SECOND external drive to serve as a backup.
A little more expense, and more to "keep track of", but if you want to keep your data protected, you have to do, what you have to do...

Ideally, I would like 2TB just so I never have to worry about running out of storage, but I could probably make do with 1TB. It is hard to say because it would be used for backup and storage, which right now all my files are sort of scattered between my old external hard drive, Google Drive, Dropbox etc. Also, the size will depend a lot on the price too. The only reason I was able to get the 2TB My Passport was because I had received Amazon gift cards for Christmas.

I will have to read up on what you have suggested though since i know nothing about this stuff, which makes it overwhelming and intimidating. All I know is I do not want to go through another ordeal like the one I have dealt with these past three months.

 

[Pixel26]

Because it's WD, that's why. I've had poor luck with WD external drives and WD NAS drives.

Agree

 

[Spudlicious]

I have three external drives permanently connected to my iMac, all of them SSD. One is for TimeMachine, one for a scheduled daily CC clone, one is for my Steam games. (I'm too old for games but play them anyway.) Three different brands of enclosure are used. All of those drives randomly show as disconnected; I just dismiss the error messages and take no action. Others on this forum have reported much the same, so I'm sure it's just a MacOS thing and not worth pursuing.