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eSATA


AussieJohn
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I seem to remember in the back of my mind, reading somewhere, that it is possible to have an external SATA Hard Drive be automatically mounted when it is switched on at its eSATA mount, and have it appear in the Device Notifier, the same as when a USB Device is connected. I haven't been able to work it out nor can I remember where I read it. I am presently using the USB Mode of connection of the External Hard Drive mounting unit but I find it terribly slow (It is USB-2) and the drive is a new 750Gb Western Digital SATA II unit being used for mass storage of videos that I am working on which were taken during my recent DEC/JAN visit to Maine in the US. This external mount unit has option for USB or eSATA connection so it only requires a cable change.

 

Obviously Sata is considerably faster than USB-2 so I would like to use it instead.

 

If I mount the eSATA via the MCC then the problem arises that if I switch off the eSATA and happen to reboot, then Startup has problems looking for a Drive that appears to be missing or maybe faulty.

 

Can anyone help me here, please. Cheers. John.

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If I mount the eSATA via the MCC then the problem arises that if I switch off the eSATA and happen to reboot, then Startup has problems looking for a Drive that appears to be missing or maybe faulty.

 

Can anyone help me here, please. Cheers. John.

If you use the noauto and user switches in /etc/fstab does it still have fits about a missing drive?

Of course you'd have to mount it manually but that's better than using USB speeds.

 

Ken

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Thanks Silver Surfer and Ken.

 

The problem with having the drive listed in fstab means that the drive has to be switched on all the time or problems occur whenever rebooting.

 

Possibly I might mount it and list in in fstab anyway, and just have to remember to switch it back on prior to rebooting then having completed rebooting just switching it off again.

 

The drive has got Western Digitals' 5 year warranty but I would like to extend the drive life well beyond that since I plan it to be my long life storage of Music, Photographs and Personal Videos.

 

I am still open to other suggestions on how to get an eSATA auto-mounting similar to USB.

 

Cheers. John.

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Hi John,

 

If you use noauto like ken says, it won't mount, and won't need to be mounted or connected even when you reboot, as the fstab won't attempt to mount it. However, when it is connected, you can mount it by clicking it because it won't do it automatically. With an fstab entry it should supercede the udev calls, and so udev won't attempt to mount it automatically. However, double-clicking the drive will do it.

 

There is only one potential problem. If the fstab is hard coded for /dev/sdb1 for example for this disk, if you connect a USB stick first, and then your hard disk, the USB stick will be /dev/sdb1 and the hard disk /dev/sdc1. Then the fstab would be out of sync. Just something to bear in mind, that if you have any other USB drives/sticks attached, to disconnect them so that when you connect this eSATA one, it will be /dev/sdb1 as is in the fstab.

 

Hope all that makes sense :)

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Thanks Ian.

What you say does seem to make sense. However I do use USB sticks, so sure there will be a problem as you describe, and one I can do without.

 

You say........"However, when it is connected, you can mount it by clicking it because it won't do it automatically. With an fstab entry it should supercede the udev calls, and so udev won't attempt to mount it automatically. However, double-clicking the drive will do it."........Where do you mean "double click it" exactly ??.

 

 

Cheers. John.

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Thanks Ian.

What you say does seem to make sense. However I do use USB sticks, so sure there will be a problem as you describe, and one I can do without.

 

You say........"However, when it is connected, you can mount it by clicking it because it won't do it automatically. With an fstab entry it should supercede the udev calls, and so udev won't attempt to mount it automatically. However, double-clicking the drive will do it."........Where do you mean "double click it" exactly ??.

 

 

Cheers. John.

 

Within KDE or Gnome for example, you see the drive listed and so can open it. This will also mount it at the same time when you click it, or at least should do. As Ken said (forgot about that) use the UUID in fstab then you won't have the mounting problem I mentioned if you used /dev/sdb1 or whatever.

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