External USB drive unmounts when system idle

When I'm away from my computer for a while, the external USB drive unmounts. I've gone into Advanced Power Settings so that the hard disk never turns off, the system doesn't sleep or hibernate and the USB selective suspend is disabled, but the problem remains. This didn't happen to the exact same system under XP. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

Jon

The HDD could be failing.

Are you connecting it to a USB port on the case or one on the back panel?

Connected through a USB hub. Going to try direct to the PC and see if that takes care of it.

Jon

The reason I'm asking is because there appears to be an issue with the Antec front panel header's USB configuration, ie. pin 10 (USBOC) is live and connected, whereas it shouldn't be used at all.
See the screen snips of your MB's pin layout and the Antec P180's USB jumper layout that I've attached.
There is a possible solution to all this, if you're willing to try it. Shut down your pc, remove the side panel, ground yourself, remove the front panel USB header/s from the motherboard, locate pin 10 (should be a brown wire) in the jumper. Look at the header from the top, where the wire terminates into the connector, there should be a tiny little copper tab which acts as a retainer for the pin into the connector. Carefully push a small pin into the connector for the USBOC wire (pin 10) and release it by pressing back the tiny tab while sliding the wire out. Bend the wire back onto the cable bunch and insulate it with some electrical tape.
Post back and let me know how it goes.

There's further information here, on the MSI and Antec forums

The front panel USB is probably controlled by the same chip that controls the back panel USB's, so the front panel configuration could also be affecting the back panel USB's performance...

There's also the possibility the power management scheme is placing the hub into passive, or sleep, mode after a certain period of inactivity and that this could allow the drive to disconnect - and itself enter a sleep state.

Hi jbr613, how did you go? Did you get the usb problem sorted out? If so, what was the cause?

Orpheous: I had thought the problem was solved by connecting the drive through the back panel USB, but this morning the drive had unmounted again, so I'm going to try the pin 10 mod you suggested today.

Qdos: I have modified the power mgt scheme so that the system doesn't sleep. Basically, I just turn off the monitors.

Thanks to both of you for your suggestions, though I still don't understand why this wasn't a problem in XP!

Jon

Before you try the pin 10 mod, can you check in your bios for power management settings, it may be under advanced chipset features and make sure that 1. HDD Down in suspend & 2. HDD Power Down are set to disabled. Being as you don't use sleep mode you don't need them.
If you've disabled sleep mode in W7 it should overide these settings if they're enabled, but stranger things have happened....

Well, I'd like to use sleep mode, but I've disabled it to try to track down the problem here. So I'm inclined to go ahead with the Pin 10 mod.