Coss Posted November 4, 2003 Report Share Posted November 4, 2003 Further to some posts about Panther in the striping and firewire thread, here's some advice I was sent.... In just the few days that Mac OS X 10.3 (Panther) has been available, we've seen so many reports of data loss that we must recommend waiting until these issues are resolved before upgrading to Panther. The two most common are: External FireWire hard drives (both FireWire 400 and 800) can become unusable and require reformatting if you install Panther on an internal drive, then restart with the FireWire drive attached. Several hard drive enclosure companies have posted firmware updates on their websites for their FireWire 800 drives, but this problem has also affected FireWire 400 drives. So, until a cause and fix can be identified, be sure to unmount and disconnect all FireWire drives before shutting down or restarting under Panther. Panther's FileVault feature is intended to safeguard your data by encrypting it on-the-fly. Unfortunately, it seems to corrupt existing disk image files, and some users report that it corrupted their personal data in applications such as Address Book, iPhoto, iTunes, iCal, and Mail. If you must use Panther, we recommend disabling FileVault in the Security preference panel. If you do experience a FireWire disk failure, the only utility that seems to be able to recover data is Prosoft Engineering's Data Rescue X ($89): <http://www.prosoftengineering.com>. If Data Rescue doesn't recognize your drive, try using Apple's Disk Utility to Erase the drive, then immediately try Data Rescue again. (Disk Utility's Erase only deletes the directory information from the disk, not the files themselves.) Prosoft is offering a $10 discount to people needing Data Rescue X to recover FireWire drives corrupted by Panther, by using this offer code: PAN911. Based on our experience with previous major upgrades to Apple's operating systems, we are certain that these issues will be resolved quickly. We're also certain that Panther's amazing new features will inspire you and improve your efficiency. We will have much more information about Panther in our November issue, which will be available in a few days. For the latest reports on problems with Panther, we recommend visiting www.macintouch.com and www.macfixit.com. Cheers Coss Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gobbledonk Posted November 4, 2003 Report Share Posted November 4, 2003 Thanks, Coss - I guess we cant expect a *totally* bug-free dot-zero (OK, 10.3.0 ....) release of anything, but this is a doozy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
steffi Posted November 7, 2003 Report Share Posted November 7, 2003 Anybody know if the Oxford 911 chipset is affected by this? I've got one of those clear plastic smaller laptop drive external cases made by OWC (actually a china company makes them since I bought mine from Trans International) but I'm talking about the clear plastic ones with the rounded sizes. I haven't used it much with Panther and I'd be very interested in hearing whether or not it's affected by this problem. FileVault is a bit of a joke and I wouldn't use it myself. If I am gonna use it I'm create a secure user and switch to that user with fast user switching just to retrieve the documents ... but there's no point in me having all my Music and Images encrypted and I don't have the diskspace to do the initial image creation anyway. Poorly thought out by apple. It should be folder by folder not just one big image. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
adikgede Posted November 7, 2003 Report Share Posted November 7, 2003 http://www.applelinks.com/articles/2003/11/20031103100035.shtml OWC Mercury Elite FireWire 800 Firmware 1.0 Panther fix for Other World Computing/Oxford Drives The number one question about this issue is "Do I need to update my older FireWire 1394A Oxford 911 and 900 drives to use Mac OS X 10.3 "Panther"?". The answer at this time is NO. Apple Computer, Inc. has only addressed issues pertaining to the Oxford 922 1394B chipset and this article is specifically targeted at drives using that chipset. If more information about possible required updates to older drives becomes available, this page will be updated with that data. After sporadic reports of data loss and corruption with FireWire 800 devices operating with the new Mac OS X 10.3 "Panther" operating system, Apple Computer made an official press release to indicate this problem has been traced to Oxford Semiconductor's 922 Firmware used by nearly all FireWire 800 devices, including the OWC Mercury Elite 800 series. While Oxford Semiconductor and Apple Computer disagree over what has led to this issue (there is absolutely no issue under any circumstance with OS 10.2.8 and earlier), Apple has confirmed that the issue is limited to firmware v1.02 and prior. No OWC Mercury Elite FireWire 800 product has a firmware version lower than v1.02, but it is our recommendation that you follow the enclosed link to our v1.05 firmware update page. There you will find the the instructions and software which will enable you to upgrade your OWC Mercury Elite 800 drive to the latest v1.05 firmware version. Apple Computer, Inc. is working with Oxford Semiconductor to fix this problem within OS X 10.3 Panther in a way that would not require the later Oxford 922 firmware version, but we here at OWC are happy to provide the firmware update information as an immediate and total solution regardless of what Apple and Oxford may do in the future. Please make note that this issue has only affected a small number of customers but we take this issue very seriously and highly recommend that all customers either update their drive's firmware revision. Update your OWC Mercury Elite FireWire 800 drive today to avoid any problems with Mac OS X 10.3 "Panther". The safety of your data is of the utmost concern to us here at Other World Computing. System requirements: Mac OS X 10.2.8 or 10.3 http://www.macpower.com.tw/news/2003/10/30/112 Note: There is no need to update your older Oxford 900 or 911 products! If however, you like to upgrade your Firewire 1394a products using the Oxford 911 chipset, please contact your vendor for further details, thank you Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Coss Posted November 7, 2003 Author Report Share Posted November 7, 2003 I've got half a terabyte of external fire wire drives and most of them are fortunately using a firewire bridge by Caloptic which is unaffected by this problem, 1 is Oxford 911 and I'll use their firmware updater just for better performance. So it looks like I'll escape the firewire problem when I upgrade. On a positive note, I hear that 10.3.1 is only moments away from release. Cheers Coss Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gobbledonk Posted November 10, 2003 Report Share Posted November 10, 2003 Hi Adik, Are you familiar with any issues re Panther and Canon printers ? The local Mac guy claims he spent the *entire* weekend trying to get a customers new eMac to talk to his existing Canon printer. I asked him if he'd trawled the message boards, and he said that he hadnt seen anything on this, presumably because Panther is so new to the market. Personally, I've had zero problems with 10.3 - thank you, Lord ! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Coss Posted November 13, 2003 Author Report Share Posted November 13, 2003 I saw some trouble reported somewhere about printer drivers, all the included ones may have been rewritten it seems, here're some links dealing with HP printer probs and Panther. http://www.macfixit.com/article.php?story=20031111082904416&query=panther+printer+driver http://www.macfixit.com/article.php?story=20031110081759415&query=panther+printer+driver Cheers Coss Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
adikgede Posted November 13, 2003 Report Share Posted November 13, 2003 You might suggest that he configures printers here : http://127.0.0.1:631 If the printers worked with 10.2.8 then the same printers should still work with 10.3 even if Apples default printer settings have changed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gobbledonk Posted November 14, 2003 Report Share Posted November 14, 2003 Hi Adik and Coss, Thanks to both of you - he seems to have worked it out, but its good to have this info for my own attempt to get my HP hooked up to the eMac. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
adikgede Posted November 14, 2003 Report Share Posted November 14, 2003 Better eat up those links while you can. Macfixit archives everything behind a subscription site. If you have an ink jet printer you may find that, especially on cheap printers, Cannons some Epsons and HPs, the open source print drivers print very fast, and Post Script on a USD75 printer is nice too. http://www.linuxprinting.org/macosx/ However since Macs use CUPS, I cant imagine that any problems with the Apple supplied drivers will last for long, especially with HPs that are very well supported in CUPS because HP is providing the drivers. So with a common HP printer you can use HP commercial drivers, Apple supplied drivers (from CUPS I think) HP open source drivers (hpijs which go into CUPS) or Gimp Print. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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