Seagate external HD keep flashing please help!

Hi guys,  just switched on Sonar to work and I can not load any samples!
My recently purchased Seagate Expansion Desktop Drive 2TB's light just keeps flashing and I do not know what to do, I am scared to turn it off or un-plug any ideas?

How long does it do that? Also what interface does it have and what samples? My drives are sata 2 and loading big libraries takes a bit.

I'm not really well versed in such things but I do know that many of those drives come with software to do their data transfers and I'm assuming that they are likely not compatible with something like Sonar. If you are using the included software I'd recommend uninstalling it and using it as a basic drive... essentially let Windows see it as an extra drive. Not let the "helpful" drive software handle things.
 
I am however no expert and this advice is purely speculative. I'm sure there are many helpful tuts and folks here on the forum who do streaming stuff from external drives. Good luck.

See now... these are two separate issues. Dealing with the drive itself and making sure it works properly is imperative before attempting to stream samples from it. Now data recovery is coming into the equation which is part of the software that comes bundled with those things. I think those included softwares are crud. I'd say you are better off just letting it be a generic bulk storage device (Windows should detect it as such) and not bother installing the drivers or included software. Now you can treat it as just another drive on your system. For data recovery purposes use a program like Acronis or even Windows recovery management to create your backups, images and restore points. You CAN schedule these but make sure they are only being done at times when you are NOT using Sonar or other audio applications. Personally I do that stuff manually when I feel it is warranted instead of letting the software take over. That will indeed interfere with performance.
 
This may not be what is causing your problems but if that is what is currently happening I'd say it's likely. Those included apps tend to have a mind of their own and unless you set them up in a specific way they'll just push everything else aside to do their thing. For most users that isn't a problem. For people doing audio or other resource/high data transfer stuff it will screw things up.
 
Again... not an expert but just some things to consider. As I said you may want to call or email support to set this up efficiently.

I didn't load all that Software thankfully! It remains a mystery, I took the risk and unplugged, as no data was being transferred, I have plugged directly into PC as it was linked to a ex' hub, am now copying over important libraries to other ex' H.D. with hope and fingers crossed, I thank you very much for your time and help.
 
Chris.
 
 
 

FWIW, before I moved to a 3 HDD system, I used to have all of my samples stored on an external USB 2.0 HDD and whilst it was slow in initially loading samples, playback was quick enough and didn't cause any further problems.

I think it varies from synth to synth Beep.
 
Certainly BFD2 allows the user to choose whether or not they're loaded into RAM or streamed directly from disc

I've had some really weird things happen to external drives on hubs, even on powered USB hubs.  Definitely straight to USB ports on the PC.

Oh yeah. All that should be fine. I've got a 700w Coolermaster and if I bought a third internal drive it would be the same as the other two (7200rpm Barracudas) so it wouldn't be any noisier than those although my E drive does make a bit of a clunk when it first spins up which I have to fix because it SHOULD be on all the time. I may even get a 10,000rpm now that I know they exist and use that as my C drive instead. Still not into dropping the cash on an SSD. Seems unnecessary.
 
Oh and the case has plenty of room. I think I still have three open drive bays. It's designed to take a RAID set up. Very nice case. Zalman z9 Deluxe if anyone is curious. If you can find one it is the shiz.
 
And now that I think about it I believe there is a sixth drive bay at the top for an SSD. Came with lots of ultra quiet fans too and I've got three more fan mounts available.