The Firmware Page

It does find the box. In device manager everthing looks OK. I was even able to write and read a small Notepad file. When I tried to delete it, it sat there for a while and the Task Bar changed the safely remove hardware to a yellow triangle with an exclamation point in it. When I go the device manager, it says Windows has stopped this device because it has reported problems. (Code 43). The access lights on the box stay on and the only way it can be reset is to be shut down. This can occur spontaneously after a few minutes or after short accessing of the drive via 1394.

When I use USB on this drive box it works fine (but I only have USB 1.0 on my laptop -- very slowwwww) but I want to use the firewire.

BTW the green arrow in the task bar is visable until that lock-up occurs. (and then it is the yellow triangle)

Sounds like you're having delayed write failure. Open up Administrative tools, event viewer/system.

I still can't flash the box. I've tried..

ROMWriter2.0.4.exe
ROMWriter214.exe

and with both .EXE's--
PL3507-0707B-sepower-SONY.hex
PL3507-0422B.hex

PL-3507 3341C
PMCFLASH
MH1FJ
PM37LV512-70JC

nathane...this may sound a bit simple and you may already know about it, but are you trying to flash while connected via Firewire? It's just that the flash program was designed to flash while connected via USB(1 or 2).

Yup, connected over USB for the flashing process. Use firewire for reading/writing to DVD/HD.

nathane has a Pm37LV512 PMC flash chip (as opposed to the Pm39), these don't flash with the programmers available.

Hi,

see my previous posting for more details, but my problems have disappeared:

PL-3507 external drive was giving "delayed write error" errors, and seemingly random disconnects (removal from the drive letter and tray icon) on large data writes to the Samsung drive. (Using firewire as connection method)

After I installed the firmware "0422b" the delayed write errors disappeared, but the drive disconnects remained.

Installing SP2 for XP-prof solved all problems. I can now read/write/delete to and from the drive concurrently and it keeps going.

I don't know if everybody else is as unlucky as me. I have a Plumax enclosure with PL-3507 (03513C). Updated the 07/07/2004 version of firmware. And now windows xp professional is up-to-date SP2 (final version). I also installed the max128k driver. However, the drive still can't pass the 1394test from bustrace.com.

But the max128k driver seems to make a difference. Before installing the driver, the test usually failed at <10% for a miscompare; after that, it usually finds an error at ~50% of the test.

Anybody has any ideas? Bustrace reports that SP2 works around the delayed write failure problem. Obviously I'm not that lucky. Under either USB1.1 or 2.0, the drive passed the 1394test and I never had a problem under USB modes.

Man egf_repeats...you got a raw deal....you seem to have done everything needed to fix the problem yet it still fks up...

don't know why the max128k driver doesn't work fully for you...the way I wrote it, if it works even just a bit, it should pass the 1394Test from bustrace...can't imagine why it would only defer the problem till later..sorry to hear about it

I'm actually quite sick of playing around with my PL-3507 powered enclosure...My Oxford 911 doesn't give me any problems at all... it's always the PL-3507 that acts up(albeit not as often now that I've managed to fix my max128k bug)...I'm just going to bite the bullet and buy another enclosure, this time an Oxford 911 powered one that can handle large drives..saw some good deals going around...shame I don't live in US...stuff is so much more expensive in the UK for the same product..

Btw, beware of the hotfix mentioned on the bustrace website(http://www.bustrace.com/products/delayedwrite.htm)... I tried it but then had all sorts of instability problems with all of my enclosures(Oxford 911, PL-3507, some unknown one in an external Sony dvd burner)...rolled the hotfix back and it was ok again...

I have version C of the PL-3507. Was having the delayed write problems. Loaded the 0707B firmware with max128k, WinXP SP2, and 1394test still hangs. If I disconnect the drive and reconnect it, the test program does recover and manages to finish. With the 04204 firmware, once it hangs, can't recover at all.

I have a PL-3507 (03513C) based 'Ultra' branded enclosure, which regularly caused the usual 'delayed write' errors. I applied SP2 for WinXP a week or so *before* receiving the enclosure, so I can't say if it'd have behaved differently under SP1, but the errors were definitely occurring on a SP2-updated box.

After reading up on this discussion, I took apart the enclosure to check the chip revision marking (as above; firmware updates won't work) and noted that the PCB was warm despite the enclosure being equipped with a small fan.

I left the cover off the enclosure and laid it on its side and put it in the air path of my desk fan to help cool it down, hoping it might help stability as well, which appears to have worked. This was a few weeks ago, and I haven't experienced the error/hang since before then. Of course, I can't say for sure, but actively cooling the chipset may be worth trying for those still seeking a fix for this issue.

I also want to pass the following along, as well:

When the errors were still happening regularly, I found the easiest way to reconnect the enclosure for use after a hang/error without rebooting was (after power-cycling the enclosure) to access the WinXP device manager, disable and then re-enable the 1394a FireWire controller. After this, if the enclosure is not yet being 'seen' by the controller, removing and replacing the FireWire cable to the enclosure should make it visible once again.

beach-hobo,
Any chance you could dump the firmware and post it for us?

From what I understand: "I CAN'T attach files in this forum"...

This is correct, but you can contact dhc014 or another admin and send them the firmware...

Man, this has GOT to be the worst device I've ever come across.. I got it working reasonably for a while (no delayed write errors, no disappearing). However, now out of the blue after restarts, the drive connected to the 3507 just out and corrupts itself.

I can't connect to tech.prolific.com.tw any longer, so can't get jack there. I'm running the 2007.07.07.129 firmware, however I saw someone else talking about a September rev of the firmware. Anyone got that around or know of a link to it?

I think I just may end the misery and go get a straight firewire Oxford chip case.

I have the 9/7/2004 hosted over @ CDFreaks under the NEC Forum...

Thanks man, appreciate it.

If this doesn't solve it, I've got a hammer that's going to eliminate the case from my life very quickly. That and this other SATA case that has as many problems as the 3507. Worst two purchases I've made in at least 5 years.

Well, the 9/7/2004 firmware didn't work for me.

THe 9-7 firmware worked for me but I"ve only tested it on a winXp system. Friend of mine curiously has the same chipset and case as me and has ABSOLUTELY NO PROBLEMS, currently waiting to see what firmware and chipset version he's got. I may be able to post something better than what we've got so far.

If anyone wants my tech spec's I"ll post 'em.

Hi Guys, what follows is my tale of woe for today.

I tried the new 9/7 firmware in my case and I wish I would have used usb instead of firewire transferring the contents of a WD250gb jb ide drive in the external case to another freshly formatted ntfs WD250 JD sata in my machine. FWIW I will mention that I summarily removed the then existing ide drive from my machine and put it into the external case with total disregard for any consequences. The 250 ide drive was my slave to a 160 sata drive using a serillel adapter kit on a Abit NF7S v2.0 and is the first time the drive has been in that box. The drive now is trashed but I did manage to get the majority of data off it and the balance is elsewhere backed up on my lan, so I'm cool with all that. I thank God, Allah, Buddha, Jesus, Jehovah (insert your favorite deity here) for that foresight. I was transferring 4gb folders one at a time when suddenly XP said the drive wasn't formatted and would I like to format it now. Being the idiot that I am, I happily clicked no and merrily went on my way copying more files. As if a miracle, it occurred to me that there could be something wrong with the drive when another folder puked with the unable to read the disk error again. This is all on a winxp pro system in perfect shape otherwise.

The moral of the story settles on the usefulness of backups which we don't think about enough most of the time. I was prepared this time...

And that's the way it is.

Thanks for the shoulder to cry on fellas.........

Regards, Bob

PS: I am beginning to wonder if part of this corruption issue is due to the size of the drive since an 80gb in there had no issues at all ever. Just a thought to ponder I guess.

OS is Win XP Pro SP1A

I'm thinkin size of the drive could easily have to do with it. I'm not a firmware engineer but usually when you write firmware or a chunk of code for I/O stuff. It has to handle a long list of various parameters, if it only does some of them, then you're fine on those things, but once you go uotside of those parameters, you're [*Profanity*]. My Dad is an electronics engineer so I do know some about engineering in general but nothing in detail.

This entire mess is SOOOOO ironic for me. I bought this drive enclosure knowing the chipset was not the high quality OXFord 911 chipset. I figured it would be slower and I wouldn't care, but I figured it wouuld flat out work and not corrupt the data. I"ve so far been half wrong. The true irony to all of this for me is that I went out and got this chassis/enclosure/case specifically for backing up files to and on an OS X system.

Also one other very weird thing I'd like to point out to everyone. On the Athlon2800 win XP system I can stream uncompressed video from the drive over the USB2 connection and it keeps up, it can't do this with the firewire connection on the winxp system. HOWEVER, as soon as I try the same thing on OS X, after formatting and transferring the files over, the USB 2 conection is then too slow ot stream uncompressed video and the firewire is far superiror. What this paragraph proves is that the speed of the interface isn't due to the enclosure chipset solely, because each system has a different host chipset. The dual G5 OS X setup has the oxford chipset in the motherboard, the winxp setup has a PCI card and a chipset of a company I"ve never herad of. Just thought I'd post my observations.

I Guess I should've spent the extra $100+ and gotten the oxford chipset and the othe rhigh quality USB chipset, I'd be broke but have peace of mind.

I'm going to stick my neck way out there and say that I believe Macintosh offers a superor IEE1394A implementation than our beloved PC machines.

That being said whether that statement would stand up in court is sketchy but when was the last time anyone heard of a MAC having any firewire issues like we seem to be plagued with? Isn't it odd that nearly all problems are with Micro$oft machines for one reason or another?

On a side note last night I was experimenting (read out of beer) and placed my NEC ND-2510A drive in the enclosure and using firewire the drive was not seen by Nero at all. I switched over to USB and the drive was then recognized just fine by Nero. The firmware version in the box was the latest 9/7/2004 that our friend beach-hobo brought to our attention recently.

This 9/7/2004 firmware was in the box at the time of my previous hard drive disaster FWIW.

I then flashed back to the firmware 4/22/2004 also brought to us through beach-hobo and had at it once more. Now the NEC drive is seen by Nero with either style of connection. Go Figure eh?

On yet another note my Pioneer 106d has been running perfectly in a similar case using firwire with the 4/22/2004 firmware revision also brought to our attention through beach-hobo.

I also recently heard a rumor about SP2 addressing some firewire issues but I don't have the intestinal fortitude to get into that one yet.

At least for the time being I am done with firewire and hard drives on my system, however I have absolutely no complaints whatever using my optical devices with it as all optical device operations using firewire have been flawless.

And that is all for this round.....

What I"m really starting to suspect is that simply the fireware side of the chipset is borderlined in terms of conforming to the firewire specifications. Depending on how tolerant of the borderline your host Firwire chipset is, it may or may not have problems. I"ve run into this with MJPEG video capture cards too, the avids will digitize the squigley mess of a picture when you fast forward a tape, others can't and flip out trying to find the horizontal sync pulse in the NTSC signal. It's a matter of how tolerant the hardware is of something going borderlined of out of spec.

THe USB2 side may not be as fast as the firewire side (your mileage will vary at this point) but it does seem to be safer and more within the USB2 spec/tolerances. I've had no problems at all with the 9-7 firmware, I even maxxed out a 120 gig drive in it, used toast to compare files, and then did a defrag, and had no problems at all, but this was with a HD not an ATAPI interface optical drive. Though windows does list it as being a ATAPI drive despite it being a harddrive.

This really proves the saying 'you get what you pay for'.

Hello. Thought I'd post this. I"ve decided to get rid of the case using the Prolific 3507 chipset altogether. I did a backup of my dive FINALLY last night and on verification the chipset casued teh bus to hang. In other word sthe lastes firmware I could possibly get isn't 100% solid.

Quite frankly I"m really puzzled why this chipset is even on themarket let alone why a case utilizing it was sold to me through a reputable website. I"d post the URL of the website here but I don't want to [*oops*] anyone off and doing so is probably forbidden and in the list of things I had to agree not to do to have the ability to post here. IE no endorsements etc....Since it has been 3 weeks since the purchase I"m [*Profanity*], it can't e returned, I Plan to sel it to a friend that won't be using it to shove 30 + GB files through, unlike me. Told him how 'wonderful' the drive is and he was still intersted.

I think I"ll choose to boycott any product that works with a chipset from prolific, regardless of what product or chipset.

I"m really puzzled and wonder if a chip is defective on the bridgeboard but I"ve endured so much utter crap I don't care. YOu get what you pay for, enough said.