NUC DC3217BY and LaCie D2 Thunderbolt 2

[FMeaz]

Hi to all,

I am new to this community and to the NUC world.. I have the DC3217BY, recently received as a gift, and after some good experience I noticed a strange behaviour when connecting the Lacie TB2 drive; while putting the plug inside the monitor blinks, like it have been swithced on/off rapidly, but after the drive seems to work. I tried to do a Windows Image Backup but I didn't success because after some seconds the system warned me that the drive could have been disconnected or not working.

Testing the drive on my MBP I didn't see anything wrong, I've always used it for time machine backup; so I tried on the NUC with another cable, but same problem.

Finally, after some in/out trials, I noticed a little spark between the female slot and the cable, that gave the blink on the monitor.

Is it an hardware problem? Any Ideas?

I have a mini display port monitor adapter but I didn't try it, should be worthy to try by connecting monitor with it?

Thanks in advance.

[idata]

Hi febio,

I understand you are connecting an external Thunderbolt hard drive for backups and you are getting some problems while performing the backup session.This problem does seem to be related to a hardware problem based on the fact that you mentioned "sparks" coming out of the cable and the slot and you tested the external drive using a different computer.This is a bad sign that It might be a defective slot on the Intel® NUC.Hope this information is helpful. Please let me know if this resolves your issue and/or if you need further assistance.Allan.

[FMeaz]

Hi Allan and thanks for the reply.

"sparks" coming out of the cable

Regarding this, TBH sometimes I noticed something similar while using the TB2 hard drive on my MBP. Especially, for example, when the male plug of the cable touches the aluminium body near the female plug. BUT, this has never been given any problems. No blinking no stopping, nothing.

This is a bad sign that It might be a defective slot on the Intel® NUC.

This maybe could give me some pain, as long as I found the TB slot so good. How can I spot this eventuality and, sigh, how can I get rid of that?

[idata]

Hello febio,

After reviewing this issue I wanted to ask you if you are able to connect just the cable without the external drive. Does it spark? again, just the cable.If it does not, you will have a proof that the external device causes this sparking issue.Allan.

[FMeaz]

I'll try this evening.. to remark,

same drive, different cables trial - done and "sparking"

I'm trying with

different cables not attached to anything

AND

I remembered now that I have an external GPU unit that I use with MBP, I can try this too.

But, just as aknowledgement, I remember that TB and TB2 carry 10w (TB2, not sure about standard TB honestly).

Does this have to be blamed for the spark? I know that theoretically TB ports are retrocompatible with TB2 devices, but anyway I wll ask to Lacie about their specific device.

Finally.. would it be repairable? Or I had to replace the mobo in case ??

Thank you!!

[FMeaz]

I'm trying with

different cables not attached to anything

DONE. No spark.

Keep updating.

[idata]

Hello febio,

Thank you for updating this post.So, no spark when you have the cable attached to the Intel® NU, without connecting the external drive. This is interesting.Allan

[idata]

Hello febio,

I was wondering if you did more testing on this computer. Thank you for your time.Allan.

[FMeaz]

Good morning,

yes I tested the external gpu enclosure but tbh I think I'm encountering a driver issue. In detail, I tried connecting the nuc at the box, via tb, then the gpu at the tv, but nothing good happened.

I instaled the driver but after the reboot, nothing displayed. I connected the NUC with teamviewer at another pc and I manage to open the device manager, which displayed my GTX970 in the graphic cards BUT with the alert yellow triangle (error message in italian: "Il dispositivo ha riportato un problema ed è stato interrotto. (Codice 43)" ||in english shoub be Windows has stopped this device because it has reported problems(Code 43) )

Any help would be appreciated about that, but about now I can't resemble a tb issue.

I'm starting to fear I have an electrical issue on the wall plugs, next step could be try with *everything* (sigh!) connected to different plugs.

[idata]

Hello febio,

You could try testing the Intel® NUC and other computer components in a different location, this will determine possible home electrical issues.Allan.

[n_scott_pearson]

I did some digging. The DC3217BY NUC utilizes the D33217CK motherboard. According to the TPS for the D33217CK, the Thunderbolt interface is provided by an Intel DSL3310 (Cactus Ridge) controller. My understanding is that this controller supports only Thunderbolt 1 capabilities; Thunderbolt 2 capabilities were not available until the DSL5520 (Falcon Ridge) controller. This likely explains why issues are arising using the Lacie Thunderbolt 2 hardware with this NUC.

...S

[idata]

Hi Scott,

Thank you, Scott, for this information, this is really helpful. I did check the TPS but was not able to find this detail about the Thunderbolt controller. This will definitely explain this matter.Thank you for your time.Allan J.

[FMeaz]

Well it sounds sad but correct.. but why I read about people using tb2 devices on tb ports? (I can link if it's permitted) the only thing affected seems to be the data rate.

Excuse me I'm not meant to be polemic, but I want grab any little hope to make my tb2 devices work on the little beauty

[n_scott_pearson]

It is certainly possible that TB2 devices could support a compatibility mode for TB1. Whether this is the case here is unclear; more investigation - and possibly testing - will be needed to determine this.

I will also comment that it took looking at quite a few references for me to determine that this was only a TB1 controller. The Wikipedia pages did a good job of tying this all together.

...S