Buffalo Forums

I am trying to connect an external USB drive: 1TB Seagate FreeAgent

Have spent over 16 hours trying every suggestion online.

The drive is recognized but there are no details for the drive. No size, manufacturer, etc.

I tried to format it using every option the 420 offered. it will not format.

So I diskpart.exe "cleaned" the drive (Win7).

The drive was installed, 420 rebooted, disk formatted ... can't format ... re-formatted with a different setting ... can't format ... re-cleaned, re-formatted ... tried every possible format type. I even used third-party FAT32 formatters as a last-ditch effort.

The 420 does not recognize that the drive is formatted.

In previous firmware versions it would claim the drive was successfully formatted, then nothing, no change.

Firmware Ver 1.31 - 0.92 won't format the drive no matter what you do. The drive always appears as unformatted with no drive details.

Anyone have any suggestions?

On 3-16-2014 I sent a request for help to Buffalo tech department.
The USB drive is mounted, but no disk information shows in the USB drives list. "USB Disk 1 unformatted"
Disk will not format.
I have used diskpart to wipe the drive and also Seagate software to clear the disk.
I have tried all 3 Formats offered by Buffalo formatter. None work.
USB flash drives are recognized and register for share.
I cannot find any answers that work on the Buffalo forums. Also, the forum site needs maintenance. Too much spamming.
This a nice product. Please make it work. I am looking for NAS units for my clients, but USB drives must function for backup.

SupportTech March 18
Thank you for contact Buffalo Support, sorry for your inconvenience. Please Log on to Buffalotech.com, go to Support/downloads.  Insert the model number, depress the enter key.  Below the model number the area will populate with the latest downloads.  Download the Firmware update, LinkNavigator.    If there are any further problem please contact Buffalo Tech Support line.

* I attempted a few replies to this email from Buffalo but the emails were rejected. Then I sent another request through the online form:

Thank you for your reply. Your tech support does not allow replies to your replies. Why make it so difficult for your clients?
However, I am already running the latest firmware and had downloaded the latest LinkNavigator before I contacted you. I am an IT guy and a software architect, so I have researched the problem extensively. There is no remedy online and many others having the same issue with the 400 series.
The fact remains that the unit will not format a popular USB drive nor recognize a pre-formatted FAT drive.
What's next?

SupportTech April 12
I would recommend you removing the partition on the external drive through windows disk management and then plugging the drive into the Linkstation and formatting it through it's Web UI. It will format the drive to a read and writeable file format for the device.

The disk has no partitions. It has been initialized by Windows Disk Management. The disk has NO partitions.
When I started Windows Disk management, it said the disk had to be initialized. I initialized it. I did not format it. The disk has no partitions or disk letter.
The disk is recognized by the Linkstation. It says the disk must be formatted.
Message through the Web UI:
"Format failed. Make sure that the drive is not configured as read-only. Try rebooting the LinkStation."
I rebooted the LinkStation.
This has been done numerous times with the exact same results.
I have tried every type of format listed in the Web UI. It will not format.
The LinkStation has the latest firmware.
What next?

SupportTech April 26
Greetings and thank you for contacting Buffalo,
I will be happy to provide whatever assistance I can on this matter. If the drive isn't formatting from the Linkstation I would recommend first trying a different usb cable. I mean from the sounds of it we have tried about everything else. You can also do a "clean all" command on the disk to  completely zero out the drive and then try and format it. The procedure for a "clean all" can be located here http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/52129-disk-clean-clean-all-diskpart-command.html
now this is diskpart command so obviously you will have to first format the disk which I know sounds a little odd, but it should at the least ensure there is nothing left behind that may prevent the Linkstation from formatting it correctly. If it STILL fails then I cannot say what could be the issue. We could try and replace the unit for you of course as long as it is in warranty.

So this is as far as I got with Buffalo from 3-16 to 4-26 ...

So I tried diskpart "clean all". I waited over a day and it never finished zeroing the disk. There was no disk activity at all.

So ... I tried Seagate's own zeroing (clean all) software that also marks bad sector in the flash to guarantee a clean disk.

A 1TB USB2 drive took 28 hours to zero. At least Seagate gave its own product a clean bill of health after the wipe.

I tried formatting it again with the Buffalo NAS ... you got it. FAIL!

It didn't even display the size of the drive or any info related to the drive ... ever ... only that the drive existed and needed formatting. I tried EVERY variation for format.

I know the USB works because it recognizes a 64GB USB flash drive, so the problem lies in Buffalo's inability to deal with USB hard drives other than Buffalo's products.

So ... poor engineering and product testing is the owner's risk. Buffalo knows that no one wants to send a product back that took over a day to configure to RAID MIRROR and MANY more hours to copy all the data to the drive. ... then wait for ??? to send you a new replacement.

Buyer beware: The price is right for networked backup, and if you can tolerate no backup for the drive itself because it won't format your drive, or you just don't trust that a Buffalo drive would even work, then be satisfied with what you have. Don't bother configuring it for RAID mirror, go for performance instead.

Just don't us it as your primary drive for data storage unless you have something else on the network to back it up. More network traffic ...

You get what you pay for. I hope it does not fail until I can find a better solution. I just don't trust a company that sends me on a goose chase while they KNOW that all my labor will be in vain.  >:(

... and it took 6 weeks to get this far: NOWHERE!

BTW - My old Ximeta drives worked for 8 years! ... and STILL work!

... and try to figure out what the USB server is all about. Good luck!

All I can say here is I have read nothing but similar reviews... when it comes to SEAGATE drives (and a few WesternDigitals as well)...

A rep told me it has something to do what not enough power being supplied by the USB port's, but I have even read of externally powered USB drives with the same issue, so its gotta be something F/W wise that can be adjusted...

That all being said, my WesternDigital MyBook 1140, labled as WD MyBook Essential 3TB, works fine... er after the v1.31 update, it didn't work on v1.01 or 1.11


Best of luck!

I appreciate your response and apologize for the very late reply. I had given up on even using any of the USB self-powered drives that I already had. Customer service at Buffalo kept giving me the same response to format this way and format that way and delete the partition and whatever ... which I did ad nauseum ... full knowing that the firmware/hardware could not access typical and popular USB drives such as Seagate. They offered an RMA ... but with the amount of data I would have to transfer and backup in another way, after collating everything to the LS420 ... impractical. I'll look into a drive like yours and see if that will work. Thanks so much!

Also, some of the challenge questions would exclude most posters from using this forum. I have been rejected too many times. Nice way to reduce complaints. "Second part of word in most Buffalo Products" ... ???

Hallo Buffalo users,
i'm an IT tech form Italy.

I got the same strange problem with a brand new  LS220D

No matter what USB drive i plug it shows UNFORMATTED... and results impossible to format, format fails.
It shows as UNFORMATTED all the USB drives i plug... also the perfectly working and visible as FORMATTED drive from my OLD (but better) Linkstation duo 2TB.

I tested this a lot today and i find at least 1 clue:
The only USB it mounts and shows as USBDisk1 (as share) are 2 Kingston's USB dongles...16GB and 64GB so it works with 16K clusters (max 61 GB)
Anything bigger is shown as UNFORMATTED in administration and INVISIBLE as a SHARE

WORKS on LS220D:
Kingstone
64 GB
FAT32
Cluster size 16k
Sector size 512byte

DOES NOT WORK:
USB 2.0 1TB (ext psu)
USB 3.0 2TB (ext psu)
no matters what kind of partition... FAT32, NTFS, EXT3 same problem.

If the old works better than the NEW.... fix fix fix the FW please !!!!!!!

USB 64GB working
(http://s10.postimg.org/bvdkkxbrt/111111.jpg)

USB 2.0 1TB (ext psu) WORKING on MY OLD Linkstation duo
(http://s17.postimg.org/d1aye5t8v/222222.jpg)

SAME hard disk USB 2.0 1TB (ext psu) NOT WORKING on my NEW LS220
(http://s28.postimg.org/3leyd5vkt/33333.jpg)