Formatting a usb Thumb drive with sq5 not showing on Mac

SQ SQ Troubleshooting
1

Hi i am trying to upgrade the new firmware on my sq 5. I’ve done this procedure many times and I never had a problem. Though, this time I am having troubles: any USB thumb drive I format with the SQ, is not being seen in my Mac (both Mac Pro and Macbook). I ve tried few different USB sticks and I had the same result. I can see the USB on disk utility fbut not in the finder. in the disk utility is seen as u=an unmountable FAT16 disc. if I format it then it is not seen anymore on the SQ5…what am I doing wrong??

Thanks

F

2

So the USB stick formats and works fine in the SQ.
Do you record any audio on the stick or copy any files to it
before trying it in the Mac?

For sake of testing have your tried it in a PC to see if it shows up and can be opened?

3

@superorko

cant speak to a mac but when i used a memory stick in a win10 device it made it unusable in xp and others

perpaps the macos is diddling the usb stick like win10 did to me
still worked on win10 just would not work anywhere else after win10 did its thing

4

I’ve formatted and I’ve tried to record onto it and it works fine. But it is not seen in Mac OS high Sierra. I believe I have as well upgraded the firmware with the same usb stick a while ago. Unfortunately I have no PC to test it.

5

Hi Superorko,

Is the drive smaller than 2GB? If so, it’s below the minimum size supported by the FAT32 format and is not supported for use on SQ (it may work, but we don’t test for it).

Thanks
Alex

6

@Alex A&H

Do you have a link to that minimum size claim?
Or did you mean that was an AH limit on the minimum?

All I can find are statements about maximum sizes.
Windows operating systems through Windows 10 create new FAT32 volumes only up to 32 GB in size.
The maximal possible size for a file on a FAT32 volume is 4 GiB minus 1 byte or 4,294,967,295 (2^^32 − 1) bytes.

7

Hi Volounteer,

This information is available for SQ on our knowledgebase here: https://support.allen-heath.com/Knowledgebase/Article/View/understanding-sq-usb-recording-and-playback

Thanks
Alex

8

@Alex A&H

thanks
will read the link info this morning

9

@Alex A&H

I find at your link this:
The smallest USB drive size that should be used with SQ-Drive is 2GB.

Nowhere do I see where the FAT32 format does not support a smaller size like your previous post claimed.

There seems to be a disconnect between what A&H does with usb and what the actual standards for usb say it should do.

10

Hi volounteer,

you can fully trust Alexs “claims”. Since he works for A&H he is quite credible. Maybe only surpassed by Keith. :wink:

Cheers,
André

11

@Andre S

I trust but verify.

I still see nothing that prevents FAT32 from using a disk less than 2G.

I see an AH suggestion that it not be less than that.

AFAIK the standard does not specify a minimum disk size to use FAT32.
Does the usb standard specify a minimum size that supports FAT32 ?

12

The minimum size for a Fat32 partition, in the basic standard, is around 32KB

Though in Windows it usual has to be at least 5MB for some reason.

The reason A&H says 2GB+ could be due to the firmware, and perhaps due to 2GB gives you just around enough space for 2 channels recording of 1 hour.

13

@Søren Steinmetz

True but he had said memory size had to be 2GB or more which is inaccurate per even the AH link he posted.
They recommend it but it is not a usb requirement.
Block and partition sizes are also subject to the whims of billyg and microslop.
perhaps AH has their own requirements but that was not stated and was merely a suggestion.

14

it Looks like it was the size of the USB drive. It was 2 gb. When I switched to a 32 Gb everything went smoothly!

Thanks Everyone!

F