A couple of weeks ago, I bought myself an Iomega iConnect.

I had been sniffing around for a while for a USB hub, and I happened to be in PC World so I bought that model for the pure and simple reason that it was the only USB hub they had in stock.

Basically all I wanted was the ability to plug my external drives directly into the network, and this seemed to be ideal for the job.

I brought it home, unpacked it and plugged it in.  I installed the management software and away I went.

Simple?

No!

I have had nothing but trouble with the damned thing.

Initially, I connected the yoke directly to my laptop in order to configure it.  Documentation was crap, but it was a fairly straightforward process.  I gave it a static IP address, and named it FServer.  That was about all I had to do.  I moved it into the area where I wanted to keep the drives (which happens to be beside my router), plugged it in and connected all the drives.  I then went back to my laptop to start the process of mapping the drives backing up software.

I did a network search for the drives, but there was no sign of them.  I could see there was a device on the network called FServer but that was it. No hard drives.

Since then I have……

• Moved the iConnect between the office and my laptop.
• On the rare occasion I could connect to it, I tried static and dynamic IPs.
• I have tried it with and without hard drives attached.
• I have tried resetting it, but nothing happens if I do it as per instructions (holding in the reset button for 15 seconds – I went up to two minutes but the reset never happened)
• I have tried resetting it by de-powering, and then re-powering with the reset held in.  That at least turned the status light red (which is the required result) but the damned thing stays on red and the only way to get it back to normal is to re-power it again, but the reset still hasn’t happened.
• I have tried accessing it using Linux, Windows 7 and Windows 2000.  Same results on all systems.

I have trawled the Internet looking for help.  Iomega have a users forum, and I found quite a few roughly similar problems, but Iomega’s response seems always to be that a static IP should be used.  Tried that.  No good.

I connected it directly to my laptop again today to have another go.

I plugged it in, and nothing happened.  The Management software can see it all right.  It lists it as FServer with an IP of 192.168.1.9 (correct!).  However it says that it cannot be managed, nor is there any sign of the USB devices.  I tried pinging that IP and get no returns.  If it weren’t for the management software, I would say it didn’t exist at all.

I can see it in the Management window –

I can see it in Windows 7 Network mapping –

But that is all.

I think it’s about time for a return trip to PC World?

[Filed under Linux server management software]