Comment 5 for bug 264789

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archdrone (archdrone) wrote : Re: USB Hard Drive Not Accessible

I have the same problem on 2.6.27-2-generic. When I plug in USB2IDE/SATA converter and connect a hard drive, the drive is recognized:
[166914.700099] usb 4-1: new high speed USB device using ehci_hcd and address 6
[166914.842786] usb 4-1: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
[166914.854186] scsi13 : SCSI emulation for USB Mass Storage devices
[166919.866514] scsi 13:0:0:0: Direct-Access SAMSUNG HD753LJ 1110 PQ: 0 ANSI: 2 CCS
[166919.892840] sd 13:0:0:0: [sdb] 1465149168 512-byte hardware sectors (750156 MB)
[166919.893591] sd 13:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off
[166919.894597] sd 13:0:0:0: [sdb] 1465149168 512-byte hardware sectors (750156 MB)
[166919.895339] sd 13:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off
[166919.895367] sdb: sdb1
[166919.909955] sd 13:0:0:0: [sdb] Attached SCSI disk
[166919.910162] sd 13:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg2 type 0

Everything is OK so far but *sometimes* after a while these messages occur:

[167007.043468] sd 13:0:0:0: [sdb] Sense Key : No Sense [current]
[167007.043487] sd 13:0:0:0: [sdb] Add. Sense: No additional sense information
...and this iterates random-number times

*AND OR* these errors occur before, after or mixed in those mentioned above:
[167007.152099] usb 4-1: reset high speed USB device using ehci_hcd and address 6
[167037.400064] usb 4-1: reset high speed USB device using ehci_hcd and address 6
...and this iterates random-number times

I think I may have found (probably insignificant) behavior pattern and *very dirty* workaround:
After plugging the drive and mounting the partitions I check `dmesg | tail` for errors for a few minutes every now and then and IF these errors occur I *immediately* (because data loss could occur, i myself expirienced that) unmount the drive and unplug the USB converter. After that I do
`sudo rmmod ehci_hcd`
`sudo modprobe ehci-hcd`
and repeat the process.

Note1: A couple of times I expirienced a few lags during playing video from the drive. I checked dmesg and saw 'No additional sense' errors. They happend only when playing same exact positions of the movie. After doing that "very dirty workaround" stuff, everything was absolutely OK! If there are no errors in the first 5 or 10 minutes after mounting, there's a big chance everything will be OK since then. I mostly use the drive happily for hours without a fault.

Note2: I suspected everything for this faulty behavior, usb converter, drive, kernel, but the drive and the usb converter works fine mostly immediately after doing that "black magic" with ehci. Also there are quite many very similar stories with different hardware on the Net. So It has to be the kernel to blame.