Possible Firmware Update for USB-SATA-U3?

1

Just purchased a U3 HDD docking station and having issues with Truecrypt reading drives that have been encrypted and formatted using another brand HDD dock.

I have several 3.0Tb disks that were formatted and encrypted using another external dock (another brand). The other dock only supported USB2.0. We’ll call this brand “x”. I was borrowing that dock and needed to purchase my own. Decided on the Plugable USB3-SATA-U3.

What I have found is that 2 disks that were encrypted and formatted using Truecrypt the “brand x” hdd dock cannot be mounted in the Plugable. From an OS perspective, it does appear to see the disk at the full capacity. However, Truecrypt throws an error when I attempt to mount these using the Plugable dock. “Error: Incorrect/invalid parameter.”

Note, this is not the same message one would get if I was using the wrong password. The password is not the issue.

I put the drive(s) back in the “brand x” toaster, all works as designed - no issues whatsoever.

Thoughts?

2

Hi Brent,

Thanks for posting! Yes, it could be a sector size difference (which is affected by the firmware on the dock). We have a series of posts coming to talk about the background and options for different firmware.

But in short, we’ll be able to help. We’ll post back here with the blog links, once we have them. But for now, our man Jeff, who’s writing up this documentation, can help you in particular. He’ll email when he’s back in the office tomorrow.

Thanks for your patience!
Bernie

3

Thanks for the quick reply, Bernie.

I did come across this, but wanted to run it by you folks before applying it.

https://profiles.google.com/102345298…

4

Hi Brent-

The update relevant for current U3 models is available here:
http://plugable.com/2013/03/05/usb3-s…

Thanks for your efforts and research, however the update in your last post isn’t for the current generation of the U3’s.

Please let us know if you’ve got any other questions!

Best wishes-

Jeff Everett
Plugable Technologies

5

Hi Jeff - just replied to your private e-mail. The fixed worked just fine. Truecrypt mounts the disk with no issues and I wrote some data to the disk to verify.

I think we are all set and as mentioned in my e-mail - the prompt and skilled support I have received has been outstanding!

Thank you!

6

Wonderful, Brent!

I’m so glad to hear this was the right fix.

Thanks for the kind words and please let us know if we can help in the future.

Best wishes-

Jeff