How do I keep a file on my external hard drive and delete it from my internal hard drive?

I have a iMac with 1 TB internal hard drive, connected to it is a 3 TB Seagate external hard drive using Time Machine to back up my computer.
I use this computer for making family movies with videos and pictures. My 1 TB internal hard drive is now almost full with only 200 GBs of storage left on it. My external drive has 1.62 TBs of space left on it. I would like to delete a lot of the videos on my internal hard drive and keep them only on the external hard drive. I've tried this and it tells me I cannot do it because it is part of the Time Machine back up. Why can't I manage my computer files as I would like??
Also once you import pictures into Aperture or videos into iMovie, good luck having access to the initial files you imported. It seems once these programs get hold of your files they aren't accessible to you any more. I don't understand that! Anyway can anyone help me get the files I want off my iMac and onto my external Seagate hard drive?
Thanks in advance!

CCLIANA wrote:
My sister is trying to rename a file on an external hard drive...
What is the File...?

Similar Messages

How do I keep video files on my Apple TV once I delete them from my iTunes?

I want to put some video files on my TV and then delete them from my iTunes and computer to free up some space. How do I continue to keep these files on the TV and still sync it with my iTunes?

racingclub wrote:
I do this all the time. I just delete the file from my PC, but leave the item in iTunes.
Works for me.
yes but you have no way of getting that content back off the appletv, and if you ever have to factory restore the appletv you will lose the content forever.

TS1967 In the past, when I updated iTunes, some items would be 'lost'. I quit updating, still running 10.6 i do keep my files on an external hard drive, which I plug in before starting iTunes. If I leave the drive off, and update, would that keep me from

In the past, when I updated iTunes, some items would be 'lost'. I quit updating, still running 10.6. I do keep my files on an external hard drive, which I plug in before starting iTunes. If I leave the drive off, and update, would that keep me from losing any files? Also, does anyone know how to search the iTunes store by price? I'm particularly interested in movies and audiobooks... Thanks

iTunes does not have provision for automatically storing one kind of media on a separate drive, so you have some basic decisions to make first. Do you want these movies to still appear in your iTunes library, or are you content with browsing filenames on a drive in Finder when you want to look for one? The second's the easiest thing because then you don't have to have an external drive permanently turned on and attached to your computer (wired or wireless). To do that you literelly only need to drag your movies folder to an archive drive and delete movies from iTunes. To watch them again you can add it back to iTunes while holding down the option key so the movie is used from its location on the external drive.
There's ways to move the movies to an external drive while keeping them in iTunes but the external drive iwll always have to be turned on and connected to the computer or you will see a bunch of broken link exclamation marks.
Realize what you are talking about is not "backup". Backup (which you should do) is putting a second or more copy of items on external drives for the day when your internal drive fails and everything on it is lost, inclduing all your home photos and perhaps things that have been pulled from the iTunes Store and can no longer be re-downloaded.

Bought a MBA and am trying to keep iTunes files on an external hard drive. Having problems.

Hi, I bought a MBA 13" and want to keep my iTunes files on an external hard drive to save space.However, I keep running into problems. I can't get the iTunes Media folder to stay on the folder in my external hard drive. Whenever I unplug it, regardless if iTunes is open or not, it changes back to the media file on the MBA. I tried renaming the media folder and deleting it, but the computer just makes another if I do that and then ends up deleting my whole library, forcing me to load it all back from my hard drive. Can anyone help me out on this? Thanks.

In iTunes 11 uncheck the preferences setting in in the iTunes Preferences panel "Advanced > Copy Files to iTunes Media folder when adding to Library"

How do i transfer video files to an external hard drive to free up space?

How do I transer video files to an external harddrive to free up space on the computer? it seems that the files i transfer stay on the computer harddrive as well as the external.

Once you copy (which is what you are doing when you move files to another drive) the files, you must then take the original files and delete them by putting them in the trash and then emptying the trash.
Be sure you test the copies to make sure they work before you delete the originals.
Best of luck.

How do I rename a file on an external hard drive

My sister is trying to rename a file on an external hard drive and when she right clicks on it, it does. to give her any options to change file name or anything

CCLIANA wrote:
My sister is trying to rename a file on an external hard drive...
What is the File...?

How to open a library file on an external hard drive

My old laptop died.
I have my old internal hard disk in an external hard drive enclosure. Now I want to open the home / library/ application support / mail file on the external drive and copy the emails from it to my new laptop. Option Go shows only the internal library file but it doesn't open the external one. An suggestions on how to do this. I am trying to do a relatively clean install so don't want to use the migration App.

Use the Go to Folder command in Finder, View menu.
Also note that Mail is not in the Application Support folder, but straight in the Library.
The path to your external Mail folder will be in the form /Volumes/<Name of external drive>/Users/<username>/Library/Mail
If you didn't change the name of the old drive, it will be Macintosh HD, also.
I don't know what name it will use for the mount point in Volumes. You may be able to tell by going to Computer from the Go menu.
You can definitely tell by using this command in the Terminal (just copy the whole line and paste it into Terminal):
ls /Volumes.
Once you know what name it uses, you can fill in the placeholders in the path example above. Use that in the Go To Folder path field.
Note that you can use Go To Folder while in an Open File dialog, also. With the dialog open, type cmd-shift-g.

How do I keep my library on an external hard drive?

I have limited space on my lap and want to redirect all files to be saved and accesed via an external hard drive. I already have media on this drive but when I redirect the itunes folder to this location it does not read the files.

Hey qmx,
It sounds like you want to move your iTunes Media folder. The following article outlines how to do so:
iTunes for Windows: Moving your iTunes Media folder
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1364
If your hard drive is nearly full after loading all your music and other media into iTunes, or if you just want to move all those music and media files to another hard drive on your system, here's a way to make the move while retaining all your playlists, ratings, and play history.
Thanks,
Matt M.

How do I keep my media on an external hard drive but still access it in iTunes?

I just recently purchased a new Macbook Air and I had my itunes media library on an external hard drive. How do I access my itunes media on the macbook air from the external hard drive without transferring all the media onto my macbook air? I also want to be able to add and download media to my itunes and have it saved on my external hard drive. I have been trying to figure this out for weeks and need some assistance. Any advise would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

hey, basically i had the same problem as you. i had all of my itunes on an external hard drive and just bought a macbook pro, so here is what i was told to do....plug in the external hard drive to your MBA and then when you open itunes hold down the option button while you click and hold it down till you see a pop up window, it will ask you what library you want to use, click choose library and choose the itunes file that is on your external hard drive. and then all of your stuff will be in the itunes.
what i have seemed to run into though is, when the external hard drive isn't plugged in itunes won't open unless you choose another library or plug in the external hard drive. - my question is this, should i open another library on my macbook pro's internal hard drive so i can at least look at itunes when i don't have my external hard drive connected. my old macbook did this, it would point to another library on my macbook and i would still be able to see all of my media but couldn't play it without the external hooked up, is there a way to do this on lion?
i hope i was able to answer your question sam and hopefully can have my question answered too.
thanks!
- sorry sam, don't mean to hijack your thread but hopefully it will help us both - i don't want to store any media )movies, music, podcasts, apps, any of that stuff on my macbook pro's hard drive, so say there is a way to get itunes to open without my external hooked up and i can still see my media, or not see my media and i want to download a song or a app that i see when i am not near my external....what is the easiest way to get that file onto the external and not have it taking up space on my macbook pro's hard drive? sorry for all the long questions
Message was edited by: thenumbersarebad - thought of one more thing - sorry

How to back up 'new files only' to external hard drive?

not sure i'm doing this the best way.... any suggestions would be great!
i have my master photo/video library on my desktop (using a file tree that i've grown & know exactly where things are since 2003- (pre mac).
that file is on mac + saved to an external hard drive. i back this up to my external often, BUT I'm not sure if i'm doing it the best way.
i add photos, change the master file name w/ current 'added to' date, then drag or copy to the external hard drive and it copies/writes. then i go and delete 'older file date' to keep space on external. i've tried to copy using the w/o changing the file name, but then i have 2 copies of same file name on back up and i have to browse to see which one has the new photos?! is there a way to add only the 'new' photos/files to the external instead of doing a complete copy, then i can go and update the file name w/ a current date? concerned that my method of add new master file/ delete old master file will create eventual problems on the external?

BenB wrote:
The auto-backup is the database only, not the media.
To back up the whole Library totally, first make sure to Consolidate it, then simply drag-and-drop it on to the backup drive, that simple.
The KB article referenced by Karsten suggests one additional step: make sure your copy of the library is not at the root level of the drive to which you are copying it. I have not clue why this might be important.
Herewith:
Back up your Project Library and events using the Finder
To create a single backup copy of your Project Library and events, you can copy the Final Cut Projects folder and Final Cut Events folder to an external storage device.
If you are backing up incrementally, create a folder structure that helps you easily navigate through your backup folders. You could label the folders with the date you made the backup copy, for example.
Important: To avoid issues, it’s essential that you place the backup files in a folder (named “2012 Final Cut Pro Backups,” for example) that is not at the root level of your external storage device.
In the Finder, locate and select your Final Cut Projects folder and Final Cut Events folder.Your Movies folder is the default location for all project and event files:/Users/username/Movies/ Important: If you moved a project or event after you created it, it will not be in the default location.
Drag the Final Cut Projects and Final Cut Events folders to the external storage device.
The folders are copied to your external storage device.

How to work with database files on an external hard drive (USB 2.0 or 3.0)

I have Oracle 11gR2 installed on my laptop. I would like to create a database instance on my laptop, but to put the datafiles on an external hard drive (USB 2.0 or 3.0). The external drive will always be attached to the laptop, whenever the database is used. This is going to be a development machine, just to develop a prototype. Laptop is limited to 150 GB on local disk and I want to have a 1 TB database on it. Can this be done with Oracle 11g for Windows XP SP2 ?
I presume that a network attached storage NAS device would be better solution, but I cannot attach it on my LAN.
Thank you,
Milan

Sure. You can put the data files wherever you'd like assuming that the external drive is going to be mapped to the same drive letter (I'm guessing your laptop is running Windows).
Justin

How can I store iPhoto files on an external hard drive rather than on the iMac drive

How can I store my iPhoto library on an external hard drive rather than the iMac drive to make my computer faster?

Make sure the drive is formatted Mac OS Extended (Journaled)
1. Quit iPhoto
2. Copy the iPhoto Library from your Pictures Folder to the External Disk.
3. Hold down the option (or alt) key while launching iPhoto. From the resulting menu select 'Choose Library' and navigate to the new location. From that point on this will be the default location of your library.
4. Test the library and when you're sure all is well, trash the one on your internal HD to free up space.
Regards
TD

How do I add a bookmark to the Bookmark toolbar permanently and delete it from the Recntly Bookmarked list?

It seems to me that in a previous version of Firefox that one could add a bookmark to the Bookmarks Toolbar and have it stay there.
I like to keep things neat and tidy. Now when I delete this bookmark from the Recently Bookmarked list (or the Unsorted Bookmarks list), Firefox insists only deleting it from the Bookmarks Toolbar as well.
How do I add a bookmark to the Bookmarks toolbar and keep it there? Am I required to keep it in the Recently Bookmarked and/or Unsorted Bookmarks list in order to have it remain on the Bookmarks Toolbar?

* "Most Visited" and "Recently Bookmarked" and "Recent Tags" are examples of so called [[Smart Bookmarks folders|Smart Bookmarks folders]] and are not real existing folders.
* Smart folders show a list created by a query of the places.sqlite database that stores bookmarks and history in Firefox.
* Smart folder lists show a maximum of 10 entries by default.
* Bookmarks and history items that show up in a smart folder list are stored elsewhere in another folder and any changes made are applied to the real bookmark or history item.
* If you remove an entry then the list is shifted up and a new entry that wasn't shown previously is added to show 10 entries.
* If you add a new bookmark or visit a website then a new item is added at the top and the entry at the bottom disappears from that list.

How do I prevent .DS_Store file creation on external usb drives?

Hi.
I can't connect my friends or colleagues external drives to my computer without my Mac creating dozens of ".DS_Store" files on them. It is very annoying.
How can I prevent the Mac from creating these ".DS_Store" files?
Thanks :o)

Thanks for the response :o)
If I suddenly would realize that my car is leaking oil, I would not buy a machine which automatically would fill up my oil tank to a acceptable level and also wipe up the oil after me. I would of course fix my car instead.
I want to take the problem by the root. It should be possible to turn the feature off, so that the files never will be created (and without mounting the filesystem as read-only).
Where can I turn off this feature?

How can i minimize the iTunes screen to see the files in my external hard drive to enable me to compare files to see if all have been transferred to iTunes?

how can i compare music files on my external hard drive to my iTunes library?

how can i compare music files on my external hard drive to my iTunes library?

How do I keep a file on my external hard drive and delete it from my internal hard drive?

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for