External USB drive is unmounting itself after some idle hours

[liorda]

The problem is with external WD USB2.0 hard-drive: http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.asp?driveid=219&language=en

Running Ubuntu Gutsy.

When connecting the drive for the first time, all works great. If I keep using it (reading/writing) - no problems at all. But If I stop accessing it for some time (1-2 hours), it unmounts itself, without any warning.

before connecting the drive:
$ ls /dev/sd*
/dev/sda /dev/sda1 /dev/sda2 /dev/sda3

after connecting it:
$ ls /dev/sd*
/dev/sda /dev/sda1 /dev/sda2 /dev/sda3 /dev/sdb /dev/sdb1

the next lines appears on /var/log/syslog after connecting the drive:
Oct 26 18:35:04 reddy NetworkManager: <debug> [1193416504.004487] nm_hal_device_removed(): Device removed (hal udi is '/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/usb_device_1058_901_57442D574D41505A30393430373439_if0_scsi_host_scsi_device_lun0_scsi_generic').
Oct 26 18:35:04 reddy NetworkManager: <debug> [1193416504.006772] nm_hal_device_removed(): Device removed (hal udi is '/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/volume_uuid_CA18C82218C80EFF').
Oct 26 18:35:04 reddy NetworkManager: <debug> [1193416504.009169] nm_hal_device_removed(): Device removed (hal udi is '/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/usb_device_1058_901_57442D574D41505A30393430373439_if0_scsi_host_scsi_device_lun0').
Oct 26 18:35:04 reddy NetworkManager: <debug> [1193416504.010896] nm_hal_device_removed(): Device removed (hal udi is '/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/usb_device_1058_901_57442D574D41505A30393430373439_if0_scsi_host').
Oct 26 18:35:04 reddy NetworkManager: <debug> [1193416504.019625] nm_hal_device_removed(): Device removed (hal udi is '/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/storage_serial_WD_3200AAJB_Externa_57442D574D41505A30393430373439_0_0').
Oct 26 18:35:04 reddy NetworkManager: <debug> [1193416504.025359] nm_hal_device_removed(): Device removed (hal udi is '/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/usb_device_1058_901_57442D574D41505A30393430373439_usbraw').
Oct 26 18:35:04 reddy NetworkManager: <debug> [1193416504.032652] nm_hal_device_removed(): Device removed (hal udi is '/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/usb_device_1058_901_57442D574D41505A30393430373439_if0').
Oct 26 18:35:04 reddy kernel: [28370.004000] usb 2-1.1: USB disconnect, address 4
Oct 26 18:35:04 reddy NetworkManager: <debug> [1193416504.039148] nm_hal_device_removed(): Device removed (hal udi is '/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/usb_device_1058_901_57442D574D41505A30393430373439').
Oct 26 18:35:30 reddy kernel: [28396.464000] usb 2-1.1: new full speed USB device using uhci_hcd and address 5
Oct 26 18:35:30 reddy kernel: [28396.580000] usb 2-1.1: not running at top speed; connect to a high speed hub
Oct 26 18:35:30 reddy NetworkManager: <debug> [1193416530.598255] nm_hal_device_added(): New device added (hal udi is '/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/usb_device_1058_901_57442D574D41505A30393430373439').
Oct 26 18:35:30 reddy kernel: [28396.608000] usb 2-1.1: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
Oct 26 18:35:30 reddy kernel: [28396.612000] scsi3 : SCSI emulation for USB Mass Storage devices
Oct 26 18:35:30 reddy kernel: [28396.612000] usb-storage: device found at 5
Oct 26 18:35:30 reddy kernel: [28396.612000] usb-storage: waiting for device to settle before scanning
Oct 26 18:35:30 reddy NetworkManager: <debug> [1193416530.791570] nm_hal_device_added(): New device added (hal udi is '/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/usb_device_1058_901_57442D574D41505A30393430373439_if0').
Oct 26 18:35:30 reddy NetworkManager: <debug> [1193416530.877704] nm_hal_device_added(): New device added (hal udi is '/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/usb_device_1058_901_57442D574D41505A30393430373439_usbraw').
Oct 26 18:35:35 reddy kernel: [28401.612000] usb-storage: device scan complete
Oct 26 18:35:35 reddy kernel: [28401.648000] scsi 3:0:0:0: Direct-Access WD 3200AAJB Externa l108 PQ: 0 ANSI: 0
Oct 26 18:35:35 reddy kernel: [28401.652000] sd 3:0:0:0: [sdb] 625142448 512-byte hardware sectors (320073 MB)
Oct 26 18:35:35 reddy kernel: [28401.660000] sd 3:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off
Oct 26 18:35:35 reddy kernel: [28401.660000] sd 3:0:0:0: [sdb] Mode Sense: 03 00 00 00
Oct 26 18:35:35 reddy kernel: [28401.660000] sd 3:0:0:0: [sdb] Assuming drive cache: write through
Oct 26 18:35:35 reddy kernel: [28401.664000] sd 3:0:0:0: [sdb] 625142448 512-byte hardware sectors (320073 MB)
Oct 26 18:35:35 reddy kernel: [28401.668000] sd 3:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off
Oct 26 18:35:35 reddy kernel: [28401.668000] sd 3:0:0:0: [sdb] Mode Sense: 03 00 00 00
Oct 26 18:35:35 reddy kernel: [28401.668000] sd 3:0:0:0: [sdb] Assuming drive cache: write through
Oct 26 18:35:35 reddy kernel: [28401.668000] sdb: sdb1
Oct 26 18:35:35 reddy kernel: [28401.676000] sd 3:0:0:0: [sdb] Attached SCSI disk
Oct 26 18:35:35 reddy kernel: [28401.676000] sd 3:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg2 type 0
Oct 26 18:35:35 reddy NetworkManager: <debug> [1193416535.828032] nm_hal_device_added(): New device added (hal udi is '/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/usb_device_1058_901_57442D574D41505A30393430373439_if0_scsi_host').
Oct 26 18:35:35 reddy NetworkManager: <debug> [1193416535.840467] nm_hal_device_added(): New device added (hal udi is '/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/usb_device_1058_901_57442D574D41505A30393430373439_if0_scsi_host_scsi_device_lun0').
Oct 26 18:35:35 reddy NetworkManager: <debug> [1193416535.919231] nm_hal_device_added(): New device added (hal udi is '/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/usb_device_1058_901_57442D574D41505A30393430373439_if0_scsi_host_scsi_device_lun0_scsi_generic').
Oct 26 18:35:36 reddy NetworkManager: <debug> [1193416536.091821] nm_hal_device_added(): New device added (hal udi is '/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/storage_serial_WD_3200AAJB_Externa_57442D574D41505A30393430373439_0_0').
Oct 26 18:35:36 reddy NetworkManager: <debug> [1193416536.408372] nm_hal_device_added(): New device added (hal udi is '/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/volume_uuid_CA18C82218C80EFF').
Oct 26 18:35:46 reddy ntfs-3g[10991]: Version 1.913
Oct 26 18:35:46 reddy ntfs-3g[10991]: Mounted /dev/sdb1 (Read-Write, label "WD", NTFS 3.1)
Oct 26 18:35:46 reddy ntfs-3g[10991]: Cmdline options: rw,nosuid,nodev,locale=en_US.UTF-8
Oct 26 18:35:46 reddy ntfs-3g[10991]: Mount options: noatime,rw,nosuid,nodev,silent,allow_other,nonempty,fsname=/dev/sdb1,blkdev,blksize=4096
Oct 26 18:35:46 reddy hald: mounted /dev/sdb1 on behalf of uid 1000

after it unmount itself:
$ tail -3 /var/log/syslog
Oct 27 01:42:50 reddy -- MARK --
Oct 27 01:44:06 reddy ntfs-3g[10991]: Unmounting /dev/sdb1 (WD)
Oct 27 01:44:06 reddy hald: unmounted /dev/sdb1 from '/media/WD' on behalf of uid 1000

$ ls /dev/sd*
/dev/sda /dev/sda1 /dev/sda2 /dev/sda3 /dev/sdb /dev/sdb1

What can cause this bug?

[David Agnese (david-agnese)]

I've got a similar problem.
I've updated some packages yesterday (13/11/2007) as requested by adept updater and among them was an update of kdesu (I'm using Kubuntu gutsy).
Since then, my external USB Hard Drive is unmounted every time I exit an application calling kdesu (like adept manager).

[chetan (chetannoida)]

I am also facing the same problem with Ubuntu 10.10.
I have set up a FTP server vsftpd where external drive saves all the data.Now after some inactivity time,the USB drive get unmounted.This is major issue.
i will appreciate any solution/workaround