SSD to SQ

[JimParticipant]

The SQ6 manual says the USB or stick drive is only 2.0 but almost all SSD external hard drives are 3.0 or 3.1, will these work with my SQ6?

[ozdocParticipant]

I’ve had no issues using a Samsung T5 500GB SSD 3.1 external drive.

[DilettantParticipant]

In General, any USB3 Storage device should work on USB2 and even USB1 ports.

BUT: There are major compatibility issues with SQ Drive and many SSD storage devices no matter what generation they are. Only some devices really work – and speed is just one thing that can go wrong.

I just had a disaster with a 1TB Samsung NVME SSD in Combination with a realtek 9210 USB3 Adapter box – didn’t work at all on SQ although it works fine on any PC i know.

Even A&H says they cannot tell anymore which devices will work and which not without testing. And as far as it seems most of that won’t be fixed in near future.

You can always use your SD Storage device with a PC or Notebook connected to USB Port A and USB-Audio – that works fine on all major Operating Systems as far as i know. If you cannot test before and need reliability that for sure is the best way.

Surprisingly reported to work good in many times with SQ Drive are USB 2.0 or 3.0 SD Card Readers with SDHC / SDXC Cards. A 256GB Sony “rugged” SDXC Card in a USB3 Card Reader records 32 Tracks here since 5 hours so that seems to work fully, too.

Conclusion:

1) if you need to have a maximum reliable, predictable Solution, using a Notebook or even some RasPi to record/playback via USB A is the most safe Option by far. It also has the benefit that you can record and playback at the same time and that you can have much better Software for file Management on the Notebook. Windows and Mac are supported by A&H, but even Ubuntu 16.04 LTS is working as far as i can say now (so later versions should, too).

2) If you want ore have to work with USB Boxes to avoid that notebook, you really need to test that your specific devices are working and beware that you may have to exchange them with similar ones that work (what can be an endless search).

3) If you need to order your devices “blind” without test and have no time or way to return/exchange them if not working and the Notebook Solution is no way for you, the SDHC/SDXC Card Reader Option seems to me the one with best chances to work good. It also has its charm since SD Cards are widely available even up to 1TB capacity for low costs.

For myself, i now ordered a cheap Class 10/UCIII SD Card with 1TB capacity to see if that works, too. If it does, I’ll mount the card reader with a short cable and some piece of Velcro Tape on the Mixer (maybe on the top of the lamp) so it can stay there even when the flightcase is closed for transportation.

[volounteerParticipant]

yes in theory usb3 should work with usb2 ports but in practice it has many problems as AH users have found out.

I found some old usb2 drives and they all worked fine, but most now are usb3 and they all fail on the AH, but some work on a pc with usb2.

so what is the difference between pc version of usb2 and AH version of usb2?

[DilettantParticipant]

“yes in theory usb3 should work with usb2 ports but in practice it has many problems as AH users have found out.”

Since USB Users in the whole world use USB3 devices on USB2 Ports on billions of devices every day and almost none of them but AH Users ever have any Problem “in practice” with that, it is definitely not USB3 that has the Problems here – and it doesn’t even matter “who” has. It simply is likely of not working, that is what Users should know.

However, that was discussed enough in the Forum now i think. Anyone who is interested can find the Threads and even KeuthJ A&H said A&H cannot say surely if a specific USB Drive Model will work at all.

[volounteerParticipant]

@Dilettant

bad logic

It only shows that somebody did not follow the standard 100.00000%
OR
that the standard is erroneous.

I know the standard has issues and that some vendors use different chips that cause their device to fail when that make/model had worked earlier. I suspect it is the chip maker that is guilty here but that does not help us find a working usb memory item.

Could AH have been smarter in how it designed their system. Obviously.
Can you blame them for the usb fiasco?
Not really as the standard and the OEMs building the devices had a part in the problem.

You dont need KiethJ A&H to say AH cant guarantee any given make/model of usb will work — just look at the database comments.
Dont believe the results there that are conflicting then try it yourself. If you can find a usb2 memory stick there is 99.9999% chance of it working. If you have a usb3 then it is closer to 0.1% based on experimental data.

I may fault AH for terse documentation but not for the usb problems.

[Dave MeadowcroftParticipant]

As I said in the other thread yesterday…
Format using the tool I linked to making sure to use a 32 kB allocation size.
I’ve had no problems with USB 3.x devices and SQ Drive.

If you have drives you have been unable to use previously – give it a try, you have nothing to lose. If it does work for you then you have a solution 😁

[DilettantParticipant]

I tried formatting with fat, fat32, vfat and different allocation sizes. Does _not_ help here.

[Dave MeadowcroftParticipant]

Not all format tools are equal. The one I linked to works, for me anyway.
Here it is again… FAT32, 32 kB allocation size is what you need.
https://ridgecrop.co.uk/guiformat.exe

[nottooloudParticipant]

For those of you who might be wary of downloading and running a random exe, here’s more information.

Ridgecrop Guiformat page

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