Arch Linux

mob

Member

Registered: 2012-02-12

Posts: 5

USB device detected only after specific steps

Hey,
So here is the thing. A while ago my usb devices (keybord, flash drives, etc.) suddenly stopped working, they weren't even detected anymore. Dmesg didn't output anything upon insertion. I tried everything I could, but I couldn't figure it out, so I gave up.

The strange thing is that a couple days ago I had to do a forced reboot, and an usb flash drive was connected to my laptop, and it worked, it got detected. (I had tried booting with the device connected). So I started experimenting to see if I could get it to work correctly. First I unplugged/replugged it, it didn't work. Eventually I figured a way to get it to work, but I don't really understand why it only works if I reproduce these exact same steps :

$ sudo rmmod ehci_hcd usb_storage uvcvideo uas usbcode
$ sudo modprobe usbcode
$ sudo modprobe uas
$ sudo modprobe uvcvideo
$ sudo modprobe usb_storage

$ # If I plug the usb device at any other time,
$ # it doesn't work. I have to do it right here

$ sudo modprobe ehci_hcd

I've tried over and over again, it always works.

This is dmesg's output when the device is detected and ready to mount : http://pastebin.com/HQE0SgMS
And this is what it spits out when it doesn't work (in case I plug the device too early or too late...) : http://pastebin.com/QCUvdiFs
It seems like it gets stuck on that mtp probe line. I noticed a recent post on some infinite mtp probing issue, but I don't think it's related.

Hope you can help. Thanks.

mob

Member

Registered: 2012-02-12

Posts: 5

Re: USB device detected only after specific steps

Hi,
One year later, I still haven't fixed this problem.

So far I've only managed to get some particular usb devices to work. Kingston or Data Traveler usb sticks are recognized if they are plugged before booting, or if I reload a bunch of modules (usb-storage, ehci_hcd). Same thing for a particular brand of external hard drives. Anything else is not even recognized by the kernel (mouse, hard drives, usb sticks, phone). It's as if they were never plugged.

I doubt it has anything to do with this particular kernel, since the problem appeared way back, when I upgraded to kernel 2.6.33, IIRC.

$ uname -r
3.8.3-2-ARCH

I tried the linux-lts package too, nothing changed.

Here's lsusb's output:

$ lsusb
Bus 007 Device 005: ID 04f2:b015 Chicony Electronics Co., Ltd VGA 24fps UVC Webcam
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 003 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 004 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 005 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 006 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
Bus 007 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub

I don't know what else would help, since the device is not even detected, there's is nothing new in any log file after I plug it. It's as if usb support was not compiled into the kernel, but if that was the case I wouldn't be able to get some particular brands of usb sticks and external hard drives to work.

I hope someone will be able to help, it's really annoying.
Thank you.

Last edited by mob (2013-03-19 11:54:07)