USB device problems with Mac OS X Leopard?
November 7th, 2007 by Derek
UPDATE: Zoom has quickly issued firmware updates for the H2 and H4 recorders to fix this problem.
Ian, an IHR listener in Australia, reports that he’s Apple’s new Mac OS X 10.5 “Leopard” release is having USB problems with his Zoom H4 recorder—even though the Leopard update fixed other USB and FireWire issues he’d been having before with different devices.
Luckily, I have an easy solution for his problem even before Apple or Zoom can fix it. Ian writes:
…on the Apple Support Forum there is a bit of chat about incompatibility [in Leopard] of some USB and FireWire devices.
I couldn’t use my Behringer firewire interface with OS10.4.10 and had to go back to OS 10.4.9. So I was glad to upgrade to OS 10.5 Leopard and the interface works now, great but…
I plug in my H4 and it shows that it is powered and connected to the Mac but it doesn’t come up on the desktop. Therefore I can’t get any data off. I’ve sent an email to Zoom Japan and they are aware of the issue. So as far as the forums are concerned I’m snookered for the moment. Unless some one can come up with a solution I’ll be forced to download to another machine and burn disks to transfer the files. I may even have to use a PC until this is resolved.
I just tested my H4 with my Leopard-equipped MacBook, and while it connects just fine as a USB interface (“Audio I/O” from the USB menu), so I can use the H4 for audio input or output on my computer, Ian is right that trying to “Connect to PC” to move files doesn’t seem to work right now. It says “Connecting…” and never finishes, or shows up on my Mac desktop. The System Profiler application sees the H4 on the USB bus, but nothing beyond that. Everything works fine on the earlier Mac OS X 10.4 “Tiger” in my testing.
This is exactly the sort of stuff Paul and I were talking about in our editorial on IHR #48: leaping right into a new operating system update (whether small or large) can reveal bugs that stop your workflow cold. It’s why my main recording computer, an eMac, is still running the 10.4 Tiger and so are all of Paul’s Macs—and his PC is still on Windows XP too. In the case of the H4 and Leopard, fortunately, there is a simple workaround…
The card reader solution
What’s the easy workaround? Well, I never would have noticed this problem if Ian hadn’t pointed it out, because I never transfer files to and from my H4 directly. Instead, I use either an SD card reader or SanDisk’s very handy Ultra II SD Plus cards, which flip open on one side to reveal a tiny USB connector right on the card.
For both recorders and my digital camera, I’ve always preferred card readers because they are often faster and more convenient, and also don’t drain your device’s battery while moving files.
The USB problems with Leopard seem to go beyond the H4, and for some people include USB backup hard drives and even mounting disk image files, so it may require Apple to update the operating system to resolve this one. Or Zoom may find a fix and issue a firmware patch. We’ll let you know. In the meantime, it’s a great chance to get yourself a card reader for its other benefits.
And I’m going to buckle down and test the H4’s little brother the H2 for our next episode, to see if there are any similar USB issues there.
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24 Comments Add your own
1. marc vanden eynden | November 7th, 2007 at 12:25 pm
Thanks for this article. I am experiencing exactly the same problem with MAC OSX10.5. I just bought the H4 … very frustrating this bug!!!!
2. Derek | November 7th, 2007 at 9:18 pm
I’ve done some testing, and I can confirm that the Zoom H2 has the same problem with Leopard — works fine as an audio interface, does not show up as a USB storage device.
Both modes work perfectly under Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger on my eMac. And plugging in the SD card directly (outside the H2 or H4) works on both machines. So I would guess on first blush (as I said in the original post, and given that other devices also have similar issues) that this in an Apple problem, not a Zoom problem.
3. Your Story : How We Play &hellip | November 8th, 2007 at 3:26 am
[...] Yesterday I sent this email to a podcast Inside Home Recording [...]
4. Ian Kath | November 8th, 2007 at 3:37 am
Thanks Derek
A continuation of this issue and the email I sent above is that there has been an update of the system software for this problem and is available at Zoom. I’ve written about it at http://yourstorypodcast.com and how I installed it.
5. Zoom H4 Incompatibility w&hellip | November 8th, 2007 at 4:26 am
[...] Yesterday I sent this email to a podcast Inside Home Recording [...]
6. Sean | November 10th, 2007 at 10:34 pm
COuld anyone help with my ZOOM H4 related question? Is there a way to import into pro tools LE using the USB outlet? I have been doing it by the 1/8 line out jack because I can’t figure this out. Any advice????
Sorry, I am new to digital recording, in general.
7. Derek | November 15th, 2007 at 8:46 pm
The best way is probably to get the audio file from the recorder to your desktop first — just hook up the H4 as a USB Storage device, then drag the audio file(s) from the H4 “disk” to your computer.
Then import the audio into Pro Tools. I can’t recall whether PT LE imports MP3s directly. If not, you’ll need to convert to AIFF or WAV first, which is easy to do with iTunes or Audacity.
8. Duende | November 25th, 2007 at 9:17 am
I have the H4 but haven’t tried it yet on Leopard, however I am having problems getting external disk drives and external DVD writers to work on my MacBook Pro. Many the time I need to reboot to get it working again.
9. Andy | December 8th, 2007 at 5:33 am
I´ve had the same problems as above. On my emac os10.3
all works fine but on macbook os10.5 the H4 doesn´t apear
on the screen.
I´ve downloaded the upgrade(2.10) from my old emac and put it into the H4 but when starting it upp it wants to uppdate from 1.00 to 1.20(it is already running 1.20)
All that happens is i get an “error” sign.
Any solutions?
10. manny | December 9th, 2007 at 3:20 am
I just purchased my first Imac yesterday… the 2.4 gig… I purchased a yamaha mw8cx audio interface, and some nice yamaha reference monitors to set up a neat home music studio. I found straight away that while using garage band and reason there are some horrible stutters and popping sounds coming from the programs audio out and out through the speakers… These programs were behaving the same way my pc did in the past when the CPU couldn’t handle the song capacity.. It is unbearable to compose this way, especially with reason, as it just can’t even handle a small composition (a few midi files at once without making the noises). This is ridiculous considering my old P4 pc could handle more than this. I read online that the mac has issues with midi and audio interfaces, external sound cards etc, so i disconnected them and reset the onboard sound, but the audio programs are still coughing and spluttering unbearably. It’s not quite as bad now, but still… not cool at all. And yes I did adjust the latency and sample rate settings on the programs, but that didn’t do much…
Well guys, sorry to bombard you with my disappointment, but I would be really grateful if you could point me in the right direction here. I LOVE the Imac, but it’s primarily for music, which just isn’t happening.
So I’m not quite sure what to do as I spend $4000 or so this weekend setting up my studio so I can use Reason, Garageband and Cubase to compose and record music, and it’s just not happening.
11. Derek | December 15th, 2007 at 3:16 pm
I haven’t encountered those sorts of issues with GarageBand or Reason, even on my old G4 eMac, never mind a new iMac.
My guess is that it might have something to do with the Yamaha audio interface or its drivers. Have you tried, just as an experiment, using the iMac’s built-in audio input to see if you get similar behaviour?
12. Derek | December 15th, 2007 at 3:21 pm
Oh, and Andy, that sounds like something to contact Zoom support about. I was able to perform the upgrade without trouble, but they should be able to walk you through it more thoroughly.
13. Pi | December 18th, 2007 at 3:56 am
if you are having trouble connecting your Zoom H4 to Leopard, you have to upgrade the Zoom’s operating system.
Simply go to
http://www.zoom.co.jp/english/download/software/h4.php
I followed the instructions carefully (make sure you know your current Zoom H4 operating system version because you have to download a certain upgrade based on what you’re currently running on your H4) and then was able to connect to my MacBook Pro running Leopard no problem.
Best of luck to all!
Pi
14. Derek | December 19th, 2007 at 2:31 pm
As I mentioned in a newer post, I did this too and it worked fine. My H4 even gained some new features it didn’t have before, and the screen font improved. Firmware magic!
15. cedric BRESSET | January 12th, 2008 at 4:42 pm
same problem with h2 of zoom can not connect to my mac book leopard, connection failed .
cedric
16. Jim | February 9th, 2008 at 5:00 pm
I am confirming that I have had the same problem with the H2 not connecting to Leopard. However my H2 was running ver 1.1 firmware. After updating to Firmware ver 1.2 now it connects fine to leopard.
Easy to install highly recommended. In fact the firmware update was to address this issue.
The update can be found here.
http://www.zoom.co.jp/english/download/software/h2.php
Cheers
17. Tommy | May 6th, 2008 at 7:56 am
i wanna use the H4 as a mic for recording different instruments directly in to ableton live, but my iBook G4 only opens up the already recorded files. those i recorded before i plugged it into my mac. why won’t my mac use the H4 as a mic? do i need a zoom driver? and where do i find the zoom drivers for mac? i feel like such a mac n00b
18. Derek | May 6th, 2008 at 9:41 pm
Have you set it as an audio interface instead of as a stereo or four-track recorder? You’ll need to do that while it’s connected as USB.
19. mike g | May 18th, 2008 at 8:47 pm
so i’ve downloaded the new driver so that my h4 will work on leopard, but my h4 still won’t come up on my computer (obviously). Are people who are using this new driver just putting on the h4 through other computers not running leopard? is this the only way?
20. Derek | May 20th, 2008 at 11:36 pm
I’ve been able to mount the H4 as both a USB storage device (to access the SD card) and an audio interface with Leopard once I added the new firmware to the H4, so I’m not sure where your problem is.
Generally, however, I just use a card reader for the SD card and don’t connect the H4 to my computer at all, so if all you need is to get the files from the card, that’s a good option.
21. miaka | July 3rd, 2008 at 1:43 am
This problem is kind of treaky. My leo doesn’t mount my camera disk when I am connecting camera through the cable but on my bfs computer it works just fine! He has a macbook pro and I have macbook. I don’t really understand why his mounts it and mine not and we both have leopard.
22. Eric | August 1st, 2008 at 4:31 am
Could somebody e-mail me the H2 firmware 1.20 and 1.30 updates?
arrowedc@gmail.com
Thanks.
-Eric
23. john | November 20th, 2008 at 6:04 pm
A question about the firmware update:
Step #3 says: “Copy the “SYSTEM.BIN” file into the root directory of the SD card via a USB connection.”
Does this mean that I need an SD card reader in order to copy the system.bin file into the root directory of the SD card by way of a USB connection?
Is there any way to do this without a card reader? With just the H4 alone connected?
Thanks so much!
24. Derek | November 25th, 2008 at 10:35 pm
If your problem is that the Zoom won’t mount as a USB storage device, then you will need a card reader (or another device, potentially, like an SD-capable digital camera that can connect via USB) to get the file onto the SD card. That’s the whole problem.
But if the Zoom will mount as a USB storage device and you can move files to it, there you go: there are other improvements in the new firmware that are worth applying anyway.
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