If you purchased your Vantec NST-D100SU drive dock some time ago, there’s a good chance it won’t support 3TB drives. You’ll only see around 800MB of space when you plug your 3TB drive in, where 2TB drives work just fine.
To fix the problem you’ll need a firmware update to support the larger capacity drives. For some reason this information isn’t available on the Vantec website. I had to contact technical support directly.
They took about half a month to reply so to save you the hassle here are the links. The firmware update can be obtained direct from Vantec here, but if that link expires for some reason, get it here.
There’ll be a PDF in the file. Follow the instructions TO THE LETTER! I can’t stress this enough. Don’t go all gung-ho thinking you can just figure it out. You could end up screwing your drive dock permanently.
After applying the update, your drive dock will support 3TB drives. And yes I tested it and it works.
Great solution!
I’m trying to follow the instructions as per package, however, it won’t recognize the device. The application sits at “Scan bus for “initio External Storage Devices”.
How as the dock connected for the update to work properly? Was there a recognized hard-drive attached? Was it powered on before the application is run?
I had the dock connected directly to the USB port on my system, not through a hub. I was also doing this through Windows 7 on a physical system, not on a Virtual Machine.
Yes the drive dock was powered on when the application was run.
Perhaps try the update exactly as i’ve done and see how you go.
Tested with a 4tb hitachi 0F14697 drive after update and it now recognizes the drive correctly.
Thank you for sharing this firmware update, my INIC-1610P now recognizes my +2tb drives!
Hi Brandon, i am facing the same problem, just bought a new toshiba 3TB drive, and only 750gb show up when i connect to it via my nexstar docking station. I have the same issue as the first comment though – the software has this device not found message, and is sitting at “Scan bus” for “initio external storage devices”. Just wondering if the first comment or you have figure out what is wrong or what step is missing?
i tried all the combinations – without hdd (dock doesnt light upt), with hdd and dock on before the software start up, and with hdd and dock off before the software start up. I also tried on both a winxp as well as a win7 machine, connected directly, not through hub.
Do you have any kind of virtualisation software that might be taking over ownership the drive dock? Eg VMware workstation. If you do try turning that off and see if it detects.
Also try connecting it to another usb port and updating it from there.
It sounds like you’ve already tried it on at least 2 different systems because that’s one of the things I would have suggested doing.
If all else fails, then i’m fresh out of ideas!
Hi,
I have the same problem… stalled at the scan bus message…
Tried with 2 PC, 2 OS (XP and 7), 2 docking stations, with and without drives in the dock… nothing works! 🙁
Brandon mate, thanks so much! Was tearing my hair out trying to sort this one out. I suspected it might be old firmware but the Vantec website said 3Tb no problems. Thanks for helping sort this one out. You are a GOD!
Hi, i found an alternative way for making work 3tb HDD with the Vantec NST-D100SU. (Excuse my english)
I tried upgrade the firmware but with same failed results. Then, i put my 3TB WD Green inside my PC (internal SATA port) with Windows 7 x64 and i’ve configured it as GPT disk. At last, i’ve formatted it with it full capacity.
Finally, i’ve put it again in the Vantec NST-D100SU (via e-sata) and it is reconognized it as 2.72TB hard drive capacity.
I hope it can help those who cannot upgrade the firmware fix.
And i hope you can understand me 😛
Cheers.
Great solution, and thanks for sharing! 🙂
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as a keeper of old hardware, I still have my NST-D100SU dock which still comes in handy. I ran into the issue of trying to use a 4TB drive in the dock, and stumbled on this blog post. I need to check if my firmware is old, however your links no longer work. I’ve found the firmware update is now located here -> https://vantecusa.com/CKEdit/images/archive/INC-1610_update.zip
Your blog is approx 10 years old, but it might help someone else with an updated link to the firmware
Wow has it been that long! Glad you got some use out of the post. I’ll update the links, thanks for that.
So, 9 years later your tutorial is still very useful.
I bought a Seagate Barracuda 4TB but I had a terrible disgust when I saw “1.8TB free”. My brain literally froze XD
I thought at first it was an LBA problem, so I look for the original LBA of the HDD and replace it with SeaTools but nothing, the problem was still there.
And while doing research I came across your wonderful article and that saves me a HDD (and a window).
By the way, the firmware also works on the TransImp docks from MUKii (I took the V101RC1 for that). I noticed that it creates 2 partitions of 2TB in MBR (logical), so I converted it to GPT to solve the problem. And I was surprised that now it also supports dynamic disk mode, which was not the case before, right?
I don’t think I can thank you enough for what you have done.
Out of curiosity, is this your custom firmware?
Anyway, thanks a lot. I love you guys
P.S:
I don’t know if you’ve already been told, but the first link is no longer valid and if you search a little more, the firmware is no longer on Vantec (I turned the site over lol) and your second link you have to force the download by doing “save link as…” and also confirm the download as it’s not a secure download. Why not put it on MEGA?
I’m glad you found the post useful 9 years on no less 😄
This isn’t my custom firmware, it’s Vantec’s. I had a feeling they’d remove it from their site at some stage so I saved it and made it available for download here. Thanks for flagging the problem with the download, i’ve fixed it.