N61 eSATA port?

Hey all,

I'm having some issues with the N61's eSATA port, I've tried a JA and a JQ, but on neither laptop does the port work.

I'm using a NexStar CX 2.5" HD case to test it out, and the device works on the eSATA port on my desktop (both the one on the motherboard, and using the faux-PCI card thing that just plugs into a normal SATA port and ends in eSATA).

The thing works if I use its dual USB ports, but I cannot get the eSATA port to read anything.

Am I missing something here? =(

 

Could be driver letter conflict, go to Disk Management to see if the drive has been detected, if it is you might want to change the drive letter.


Or could be you did not connect USB cable because eSATA port does not provide power to the drive.

 

I thought that as well, but disk management doesn't find the disk (even after doing a 'rescan drives').

I've also tried with a number of different SATA drives.

I thought it'd be a driver, but I've tried to install all the drivers I can find on the asus website, and this is using the OS as it came from ASUS anyway.

 

Have you tried a different cable? Or trying to reposition the cable? I've had problems (especially with laptops) with esata connections, if you don't have a cable with a good clamping connector it can be hard to get it to work sometimes.

 

Using the same cable as I used on my desktop - worked fine there.
I'll try reseating it a bunch of times, see if I get anything.

Thanks for the comments guys.

 

Does the drive status light come on or flicker at all?

 

Jiggling it didn't work, always entertaining to try though.

Yes, the drive status light does come on, but on the drive its a little blue light that I get the impression is more of a 'I am receiving power' light.

 

I was wondering if it flickered at all, usually the enclosure will sense a connection and at least spin the drive up or flicker for a second.

Does the eSATA controller show up in device manager? Is there an option to enable or disable eSATA in the BIOS? I'm not sure if there is, it's just an idea.

You could also try a liveCD like Ubuntu, to see if it mounts there.

 

Live CD is an awesome idea, I believe I have a copy of knoppix in a drawer around here.

Drive definitely spins up, I'm not sure if there's an eSATA controller, I've got an Intel PCHMI SATA AHCI Controller 4 Port under IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers, and an A2ZCFE25 IDE Controller under Storage controllers.

Sound familiar? Also, there's no options related to eSATA under the BIOS I can see, and the SATA type is AHCI.

 

Could be the hard drive enclosure not compatible, it reminds me a while back I was testing Clevo W860CU with external HDD connect via eSATA port.

I have 5 2.5" external hard drives (all different brand) and I connect one them to eSATA port on W860CU and it didn't work, then I try another one which is different brand and it worked, so I suggest you can try different brand of external hard drive enclosure.

 

I own N71JQ which is similar to N61 and on mine the eSata works fine.

Are you sure that the drive is getting enough power to spin up?

I have this issue with two 2.5" Western Digital HDDs that they don't work in eSATA inclosure if they are not supplied by dual USB port from the notebook/desktop.

With all other drives I have from Seagate and Samsung, they need power from only a single USB port.

WD drive works also if I use a single very short USB cable.

 

One other thought -- are the eSATA ports on the current Asus lineup now hot-swap like USB 2.0 drives?

In the past you used to have to plug the eSATA into the Asus before bootup in order for the drive to be recognized and work properly, so this could also be an explanation unless the new ones are compatible with hot-swap like USB drives.

 

Esata hotswap works fine on my current N71JQ notebook and it used to work also on my 2 year old ASUS M50Vm.

I rememeber that ASUS desktop mainboards used to have hotswap problems but I never had such an issue on any of the ASUS notebooks that I owned and that came with eSata port.