Linux backup of USB drive using rsync hangs

Question

I have a Western Digital My Book 4TB external USB drive.

If I attempt backup using the tar command

tar cvf - . | ( cd $bkdir ; tar xvpf - )

I have no problem performing the backup.

If I attempt the backup using the rsync command, it hangs after a while, with no indication of why.

The rsync command which I used for the last 8 years without problems (with a secondary internal disks as target) is the following:

#!/bin/sh
media="/site"
source=DB001_F5
MirrorROOT=DB005_F5

cd /${source}

rsync --one-file-system \
    --recursive \
    --links \
    --perms \
    --times \
    --group \
    --owner \
    --devices \
    --specials \
    --verbose \
    --out-format="%t|%i|%M|%b|%f|" \
    --update \
    --checksum \
    --delete-during \
    --whole-file \
    --human-readable \
    --protect-args \
    --ignore-errors \
    --msgs2stderr \
    ./ ${media}/${MirrorROOT}/${source}/ 2>${media}/Z_backup.${source}.err |
    tee ${media}/Z_backup.${source}.out

mv ${media}/Z_backup.${source}.out ${media}/${MirrorROOT}/Z_backup.${source}.out
mv ${media}/Z_backup.${source}.err ${media}/${MirrorROOT}/Z_backup.${source}.err

### End-of-Batch

Does anyone know how I can fix this issue?

Answer 1

I resolved my problem (dated 2020) a while back, kept checking to see if there were any other postings related to this and did not find anything specific.

So ... I wrote up an "ARTICLE" outlining the issue encountered and the details on how I went about resolving that issue. I felt is was to complicated to try to post it here, in the manner that I felt it needed to be presented in, so I will simply post the link to the PDF offering the detailed outline of how I resolved the issue.

I apologize for not having posted this earlier, but here it is:

• Article_01__ExternalDrive_USB_quirks.pdf

I hope someone else finds this useful.