Automount and external drives and phones...

Hello!
I have questions as to using external drives (memory cards, usb drives, phones).
I have a usb swith with about 4 devices attached (2 drives, 1 phone, and an IPod) and all works well. They mount without a hitch.
My problem is that if for any reason one of these devices gets disconnected without "ejecting" the drive, then my macbook crashes, and reboots.
This is an issue as when say, my phone rings and I pick it up, I disconnect it from the cable, and poof, all is lost...
Is there a way, like *cough cough* in Windows XP, where we can tell OSX to automatically disconnect "cleanly" a drive when disconnected without having to manually eject it?
Another reason for this is, when I go home from the office with my laptop, I disconnect the hub and put OSX to sleep (unless it hasn't crashed first by having forgotten to eject each indivual device...)
Any thoughts?
TIA,
Jeremy

hmmm ...... didn't work.
-I started mac
-opened terminal
-typed in command and dragged Secondary Drive to terminal window
-put in my admin pw (same password that I had used before when I had it as secondary drive for when the mac was on Tiger)when prompted
-repeated for each other command
-rebooted
Same thing. lock on secondary drive.
Not sure if you have any other commands? Thanks for the help though so far!

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Hi I had similar issues with my GS. I was told to sync with the iCloud. However, since doing that my iphone keeps coming up with the message Activation Required and then immediately goes into recovery. It appears to do this every time I sync with the icloud : -( I would book a genius appointment. HTH :-)

I'd love some help trying to figure out why my 2008 MacBook no longer recognizes my external drive and now is not downloading photos from my iphone....?

After many years of having no problems at all on my Macbook, I recently figured I should finally upgrade my OS. I did that about three weeks ago, updating to Snow Leopard (10.6.8). I used Time Machine at least once after the OS upgrade but now Time Machine no longer recognizes the external drive I have used for all these years to back up. The MacBook does not "see" it. (Disk Utility does however.) The computer then also stopped recognizing another La Cie back-up that I have and now... my iPhone cannot download photos? Yikes.
I have, of course, shut down numerous times, used different cables (that worked for some) and the two USB drives. I even used a firewire. Nothing worked. I also tried to "Repair disk" on Disk Utility. It didn't work either, giving me an error (that I didn't save, sorry).
I read many other discussions on the file format of the external drive and of course I'd be happy to reformat the external drives--however, it is obviously a tad nerve-wracking to reformat drives before having an accessible back-up. Suggestions? I do not remember what file format they have but am pretty sure it's not the Mac file system someone mentioned. The drives are a 2009 WD "My Passport Elite" and La Cie 2007 d2 Quadra,
In terms of other hardware available, we do have another MacBook Air but it has started rejecting both drives as well (without the Snow Leopard upgrade). We have an old Dell but it wouldn't have the disk space to help out much.
Any thoughts on the process involved would be welcome. Any ideas on the iPhone rejection would be helpful as well! It is a 30gig iPhone 4 that has 20 or so gigs free (not clear as iTunes says that there are abour 18 Gigs on the phone but 24 free gigs? I may be bad at math but that's 40 gigs...).
I am checking out iCloud but apparently there are only 55 gigs available?
Will be glad to hear any thoughts. Thanks!

Good afternoon Lyssa,
Phew. First of all, thanks in advance...these blogs are always comforting help!
So, to answer your questions: For the age of the hard drive.Well, I added memory a couple of years ago (RAM and hard drive). Being a mom leads me to eat up a fair amount of gigs with photos of my kids and, in fact, I think I entirely replaced the original drive, so it is a couple years younger than 2008 since I did that in March 2010. If there is some way to verify that (whether or not I replaced the entire drive), I'm all ears. I have 311 Gigs free, so it is not a space issue. I verified the startup disk on Disk Utilityand nothing showed up.
Question 1- What formats...
The La Cie is format Windows NT Filesystem 3G ....At the time that I bought it I was still using a PC as well as a Mac and was told by afriend to use this format...
The WD is Mac OS Extended (Journaled). I again tried to repair the WD last night and this is the error message: "Error: DiskUtility can’t repair this disk. Back up as many of your files as possible, reformat the disk, and restore your backed-up files."
Also, Time Machine tried again to back-up and gave me this error: "Files can't becopied onto the backup disk because it appears to be 'read only'. You may needto repair or reformat the disk using Disk Utility. If the disk can't berepaired, you must use a different disk for backups. Open Time Machinepreferences to select a different backup disk."
Question 2. Other cables...
I used two other cables with the WD and that didn't change anything.
Question 3... Fire Wire from the La Cie
Yes, I used the Firewire cable from the La Cie and it is indeed present, though still not visible in Finder. Since it is not Mac OSExtended I know that I can't use Time Machine with it.
So, in summary...
I can plug in the La Cie and it is functional on the MacBook, visible on Disk Utility but not visible in Finder. The WD drive is not visible and not functional. So we can think it is indeed the WD that is not working.... Also, the iphone photos did, in the end, get downloaded, so it is not something more general.
Causes...
I forgot to mention that there is a "lost+found" file on the WD which apparently points to a UNIX /OS issue?
Some kind of "insurance"?....
I'm curious about how people avoid this kind of issue. You just regularly replace back-up drives and hard drives before problems come up? Time Machine is great and saves many of us from disasters, however, knowing that your Time Machine back-ups are vulnerable makes the whole system insecure. No way to have alarms ring before the drive goes out?
As for ways ahead...
It seems that I ought to be able to copy off of the WD to the MacBook then erase it and reformat it and start over again. However, I haven’t been able to see its contents except on random occasions. If you have any ideas on how to copy the Time Machineback-ups from the WD, again, I'm all ears!
Good afternoon Lyssa,
Phew. First of all, thanks in advance...
So, to answer your questions:
For the age of the hard drive. Well, I added memory a coupleof years ago (RAM and hard drive). Being a mom leads me to eat up a fair amountof gigs with photos of my kids ….and, in fact, I think I entirely replaced theoriginal drive, so it is a couple years younger than 2008 since I did that inMarch 2010. If there is some way to verify that, I'm all ears. I have 311 Gigfree, so it is not a space issue. I verified the startup disk on Disk Utilityand nothing showed up.
Question 1- What formats...
The La Cie is format Windows NT Filesystem 3G ....At thetime that I bought it I was still using a PC as well as a Mac and was told by afriend to use this format...
The WD is Mac OS Extended (Journaled). I again tried torepair the WD last night and this is the error message: "Error: DiskUtility can’t repair this disk. Back up as many of your files as possible,reformat the disk, and restore your backed-up files."
Also, Time Machine tried again to back-up and gave me thiserror: "Files can't be copied onto the backup disk because it appearsto be 'read only'. You may need to repair or reformat the disk using DiskUtility. If the disk can't be repaired, you must use a different disk forbackups. Open Time Machine preferences to select a different backup disk."
Question 2. Other cables...
I used two other cables with the WD and that didn't changeanything.
Question 3... Fire Wire from the La Cie
Yes, I used the Firewire cable from the La Cie and it isindeed accessible, though still not visible in Finder. Since it is not Mac OSExtended I know that I can't use Time Machine with it.
FYI...
So, in summary... I can plug in the La Cie and it is “functional” on theMacBook but not visible in Finder. The WD drive is not visible and notfunctional. So we can think it is indeed the WD that is not working.... ALSO,the iphone photos did, in the end get downloaded.
As for ways ahead…
It seems that I ought to be able to copy off of the WD tothe MacBook then erase it and reformat it and start over again. However, Ihaven’t been able to “see” its contents except on random occasions…
Any further thoughts are welcome!

Can I have iTunes music on my SSD and an external drive? How will this affect syncing to iOS devices?

I don't have space to keep my entire iTunes library on my SSD. Currently I have my iTunes library split as follows:
SSD: Contains a subset of music, apps, books, etc. New items usually get added here.
External HD: Contains all of my music and iTunes media (including apps... so many apps). It's usually missing the most recent items added, due to the fact I don't plug it in so often.
I ran into a problem maintaining these two libraries earlier while syncing my iPhone. When I tried to sync the iPhone with the SSD library, it would delete apps off of my phone because they weren't contained in the iTunes library there, even though I had the same base .itl file for both the SSD and the external libraries.
What I want to do is set it up so that I maintain a core of music on my SSD and the stuff I don't listen to as often on my external hard drive. I also want to keep all the space hogs (movies, apps, etc) on the external as well. However, I want this to appear as one seamless iTunes library and I DON'T EVER WANT ANYTHING DELETED FROM MY PHONE WHEN I SYNC IT. I want to be able to sync my phone without worrying that apps will be deleted and I'll have to restore them from iCloud and reset all the settings, sign in, etc. Right now I am backing up to iCloud, but my understanding is that iTunes will still delete things from my phone if they are not available in the library.
My question: How do I accomplish this? I have a lot of metadata in my iTunes library that I don't want to lose (playcounts, ratings, etc).
I currently have this:   SSD: .itl file pointing to music on the SSD, a mixture of iTunes media (some that I want easily accessible, some I don't)
                                  External drive: .itl file pointing to music on the external drive, all of my iTunes media (except for anything I may have added to the SSD)
I think I need this:       SSD: .itl file pointing to music on the SSD and the external, music that I listen to often
                                 External drive: music that I don't listen to often, things that take up a lot of space
My thought process is that I will need to somehow move music from the external to the SSD while maintaining the pointers so that iTunes knows where they are. For this I have unchecked "Keep iTunes Media Folder Organized" and "Copy Files to iTunes Media Folder When Adding To Library," and to maintain the pointers and move the songs, I'm thinking of using Doug's Applescripts for "Relocate Selected:" http://dougscripts.com/itunes/scripts/ss.php?sp=relocateselected
Once I have the songs split across these drives, I'm going to copy the .itl file from the external to the SSD and boot it up to see if it works.
Two things: 1.) Will this approach work? Can I maintain my library across separate drives this way and have it be seamless? I understand I won't be able to access the media on my external hard drive when it is not plugged in (duh), but...
2.) Will it affect syncing? When my external isn't plugged in, will iTunes try and delete things from my iPhone? It should still be able to "see" them, it just won't be able to access them. Will I have to turn off syncing apps while syncing with my external device unplugged?
Thanks very much for any help and insight! It is greatly appreciated as I deal with limited storage space and an expanding iTunes library.

This is all just a partial answer since details will depend upon how you want to do it.
Post by Zevoneer: iPod media recovery options - https://discussions.apple.com/message/11624224 - this is an older post and many of the links are also for old posts, so bear this in mind when reading them.
Commercial software utility for transferring songs from i-device to Mac - http://www.fadingred.com/senuti/
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1848 - just media purchased from iTunes Store
You'll need to get it all onto one iTunes collection on your Mac Pro, then sync the devices to that. iTunes only lets you transfer purchases from a device, otherwise you have to use third party software.
I guess you could also look into getting iTunes Match.

I have recently copied my iTunes to a new computer using the instructions from Apple site, via an external drive. My iPod will not sync on the new computer. The option to sync automatically is greyed out and it won't let me set it. How do I resolve?

I have recently installed iTunes on a new Windows 8 laptop and copied from my old XP system using an external drive. This all went ok. The problem is that i can't get my iPod classic to sync on the new laptop. I did a factory reset and re-install. It still won't sync. When I hit the 'sync' icon it does nothing. In the Options screen the option to automatically sync is greyed out and doesn't allow me to enter anything in the box. How can i resolve this?

You need iTunes on the computer. There is no iTunes for your phone. See:
Locked Out, Forgot Lock or Restrictions Passcode, or Need to Restore Your Device: Several Alternative Solutions
1. iOS- Forgotten passcode or device disabled after entering wrong passcode
2. iPhone, iPad, iPod touch: Wrong passcode results in red disabled screen
3. Restoring iPod touch after forgotten passcode
4. What to Do If You've Forgotten Your iPhone's Passcode
5. iOS- Understanding passcodes
6. iTunes 10 for Mac- Update and restore software on iPod, iPhone, or iPad
Forgotten Restrictions Passcode Help
You will need to restore your device as New to remove a Restrictions passcode. Go through the normal process to restore your device, but when you see the options to restore as New or from a backup, be sure to choose New.
Also, see iTunes- Restoring iOS software.

A New MBP (and one for the road: any highly-recommended external drive for.

If I order a new MBP 17" for architecture and planning grad program, will SL come installed on the machine? Is SL considered a whole new OS or jut an update to Leopard? I am not even sure I am wording the questions correctly, so I apologize if I am not. I stopped at Tiger because the Leopard OS looked a bit too intimidating for me back then but I think I can deal with it now. Is it a big set-back that I did not learn how to use Leopard and now I am getting SL?
thanks for any help in this area.
I will throw this out there. I also need a decent but very heavy duty external hard drive to use for the work done with CAD. Any recommendations on a top-of-the-line heavy duty external hard drive? I guess the case is the main thing but the drive should be able to take some extra abuse because I baby the MacBook Pros but sometime the external drives get the abuse. I think USB2.0 is good enough for what I need.
Thanks Again

I would imagine that you could turn up good and bad reports on any drive. I have been highly satisfied with my 3 LaCies, two dating back to 2004. And, LaCie has very good phone support.
I use only clones and drag and drop for data changes between clonings. If I had to choose one method of backing up, then I definitely would use this process. Still, one can take a dual approach other than mine. The idea is to have a clone, which is updated fairly recently, to serve as a fail-safe, system backup, and restoration device. And, one could still use TM for day-to-day backups because of the flexibility it allows in moving backwards in time to retrieve data and because it updates automatically frequently. I want to experiment more with TM. So, I will move to this sort of dual system in the near future--as soon as I figure out which partition on my main external I can do without.
For cloning, I like SuperDuper because it has the ability to make incremental clones--thus, shortening the recloning process significantly. CCC is good, but I have never used it. Actully, Disk Utility is a highly respectable cloner, but it does not have as many options as the others, including not having the ability to make incremental clones.

I have a macbook air late 2010 and keep getting a warning that my hard drive is full and to delete things so I purchased a external hard drive (1TB) but I'm just not sure what the correct way to transfer and store files to the external drive is. First MAC

I purchased a macbook air about 5 months ago and lately i keep recieving a warning that the hard drive or disk is full and that I will need to move items to trash in order to free up space on it. I purchased a external hard drive 1 TB but I'm very new to mac and ios and unsure as to how I'm suppose to transfer my files (video, pics, music etc.) from my mac over to the external hard drive in the correct way so I won't end up deleting them permenately or screwing anything up with my mac as far as the applications and programs being able to run. Am I supposed to just copy to the external hard drive and then move to and empty the trash? That's pretty much all I could come up with, but then what if i need or want to access that file again at a later time. Also, I have an i Phone and i pad so with i cloud it automatically syncs all my purcheses and if i delete something from itunes on my mac it deletes from my ipad.
I'd appreciate any kind of input i think im just a little lost here. I have to say i love my Mac and wouldn't trade it for anything (except maybe a macbook pro w/more memory)... Is there something I'm missing???

To free up hard drive space the best bet is to move data files that you don't need access to all the time. Likely candidates are music, video, and photos. Things like word processing and spreadsheet files can also be moved but they tend not to be very large and so don't free up much space. The problem with moving the above mentioned files is that iTunes and iPhoto need to know where the files are stored.
Here's an article explaining how to move the iTunes folder. You can move the iPhoto library using the Finder but there is a slight complication. Start iPhoto, open the Preferences and click on the Advanced tab. The first option is "Copy items to the iPhoto Library". If this option is checked, copy the iPhoto library to your external folder (drag it from the Pictures folder to your external drive) and then delete it from your Picture folder. If this option is not checked, it is a bit more complicated and we'll need to talk a bit.

Moved i tunes and files to external drive and now have 3000 files???? help

I moved all files to an external drive and now show all files as seperate how do i find my playlists and also put the items back into i tunes form??? so f#%@ing confused and also the library comes up as a huge dos read file?
what do I need to do.
i local to portland free diner to wjo ever helps me out or my wife is going to kill me for severe time lost!~

Import is just a word for copying photos from the phone to a computer and not that different than what I do in Windows -- although I haven't compared the speed on a large number of photos. If you are importing and using iPhoto, you might try doing it with Image Capture which will allow you to copy them directly to an external drive. It may be faster than doing it to iPhoto but I haven't compared the speed. Instructions from http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4083 are shown below.
Connect the iOS device to the computer.
If Image Capture does not open automatically, you can navigate to your Applications folder and open Image Capture from there.
Choose the location to which you'd like to import pictures.
Click Options.
Click the Options tab if it isn't already selected.
Enable the option "Delete items from camera after downloading".
Note: Deleting photos after importing helps to reduce Camera Roll size, and it improves backup and restore times. You may choose Keep Photos if you wish to import the photos to additional computers.
Click OK.
Click Download All.

Moved media to external drive and now iphone won't sync!

Hi friends
I recently posted this question here: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5301334?start=0&tstart=0
And Chris was very helpful, but I still can't get it to sync.
The update is that I have now successfully updated my ipod nano and my ipad, but when I plug in my iphone 4s, it goes through the syncing motions, then says "cancelling sync" when it gets to step 6 of 6.
Here is my original post. Please help! :
I recently moved ALL of my media (music, movies, etc) to my external Seagate 1TB hard drive to free up 200+ gig on my Macbook pro. I followed all of the steps, everything works perfectly, iphone is recognized and syncs all playlists, apps, etc EXCEPT it won't add any new music since the transfer.
So for instance, I added a new playlist for the new NIN album. It sits in the exact same place as all of my other music, but when I sync the phone, it only syncs the older media and NIN is nowhere to be found on the iphone.
I've scoured every message board and blog I can find and can't seem to find the answer.
Anyone??

I updated itunes and my iphone with the new IOS7 last night and phone will still not sync with itunes.
Is there really not ONE person in the entire Apple community who can help with the most basic problem there is - syncing my phone with itunes???
I'm asking nicely - please help!!!

External drives and disk space for iPhoto, iTunes...

I'm ill and cannot spend much time sitting at a desk, so I have to a MacBook (aka, when real sick, I can work in a layZboy or in bed).
So now I have the 17" MBP with 500G, and should upgrade the GHz to 8 as soon as prices drop.
Here WAS my plan:
I'd put my iPhoto library on an external hard drive (EHD), because I already have about 30.000 pictures, most in RAW format, and they take a LOT of space... (semi-pro photographer) Yup, you read right. iPhoto, not Aperture. Switched to Snow Leopard and my Aperture isn't up to date anymore, don't have the money for Aperture2 and realized I prefer how iPhoto works for organizing... Except there is no referencing... And I also want to finally have all my pics together. Pics I had put on DVDs, finally scan old pics... But I won't have enough space!
So I wanted to use an EHD to put my iPhoto library...
And of course, make a backup of that EHD with another one, which I wouldn't keep in the house, in case of a fire or theft.
But I realized I have a HUGE problem!
My computer is a laptop!
I don't use it in one place alone!
So I can't realistically have an EHD plugged in all the time (especially since they need power!)
I have Airport. It's how I do my TimeMachine backups. Works well. Maybe a little slower, but I don't have any cables!
But would it be possible to use EHD and iPhoto the same way?
I'm not so sure...
I will need to work off the EHD regularly... opening RAW pics, editing them in Photoshop...
Any ideas? Should I buy my EHD?
I don't want to change my computer again... and I can't, realistically.
Physically, I don't have a choice. It's a laptop or no computer work.
When I shopped it was the biggest drive possible in a laptop.
Please help...

Your need for a portable computer forces you to make some compromises — no way around that.
Western Digital has announced the impending availability of a 1TB 2.5" notebook hard drive, and its 640GB and 750GB offerings are currently available:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136459
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136414
The 640GB drive is 9.5mm high and will fit into all MBPs. The 750GB drive is 12.5mm high and has been reported to fit into a Late '08 15" unibody MBP, despite not meeting the 9.5mm maximum height spec for that model. The much-anticipated 1TB drive, not available yet, is also expected to be 12.5mm high.
Any of these drives could be used externally if mounted in a suitable enclosure. Note that many enclosures for 2.5" drives will not accommodate a 12.5mm high drive; one must be careful to buy an enclosure that will. I would not under any circumstances buy a WD hard drive in a WD external enclosure. There have been more reports of trouble with WD prepackaged external drives in these forums than with all other external drive brands combined. WD's drives themselves are fine; WD's enclosures seem fraught with multiple problems. If you want to use one of these drives in an external enclosure, I recommend buying the drive and enclosure separately and putting them together yourself. I can highly recommend OWC's portable drive enclosures, but I don't know whether or not any of them will accommodate a 12.5mm drive. Call them and ask:
http://eshop.macsales.com (phone number is at top of web page)
3.5" desktop external drives are available in larger capacities at lower prices than notebook drives, but of course they're larger, heavier and less portable, always requiring an external AC power supply. If you need a capacity of more than 750GB right now, these are the only option available to you.

I think I have blown out my USB ports. Plugged eternal drive to USB port; drive also had an AC plug which I plugged in. Screen went white; unplugged external drive (both USB and AC plug). Restarted MAC Pro. Everything came back except USB ports

I think I have blown out my USB ports. Plugged in an external drive to USB, but drive also had an AC connection which I connected. Whole screen went white; unplugged external drive (both AC and USB) and shut down MacPro. Restarted and everything came back except access to USB ports. Have tried to reset PRAM and SMC. No success. Have I blown out the electronic circuitry to my USB ports?

Thanks for the response, but ironically enough, I feel really stupid after posting that because a couple minutes after posting that my DELL mouse started working again, but I honestly don't know how long that'll last. After it started working again, I tried switch which port it's plugged into again, and the other one (the one closest to me) still isn't working. If it stops working again (which it probably will), I'll definitely take it to the Apple Store. But, for some reason almost every time I take a device to the Apple Store, it fixes the problem itself when I get there, and then stops working after I leave (like just now.)
That's happened a couple times, like when my computer was heating up alot, and when my phone's sound kept shutting off by itelf.
Anyways, I want to keep this discussion up just because I know it'll stop working soon. But, yeah, I was planning on taking it to the Apple Store anyways, but I think the earliest I can is probably Saturday or Sunday, so I'll do that then.
Thanks for the response!
Scott

Moving music to external drive and combining multiple itunes accounts to 1

Some how I have a couple of different itunes accounts. I had itunes before I got an iphone and bought some music that i listened to on my mac. Then i got an ipod and bought music. Then got an iphone and bought more stuff. And then my new iPhone 4. But the music is all on different "accounts" sort of. When I open my itunes I have under "store"
Purchased
Purchased on Susan's iphone
Purchased on Susan's iphone
But I can't combine them all together on my current iphone 4, yet I bought all those audio books and music!
I asked at the Apple store and they said move all the music to an external drive then plug in the phone and when it asks if I want to do something or other (sheesh I can't remember it all) say yes and it will make one account, delete some of the music, then move the music that is on the drive into that account.
So I have an external hard drive. I have itunes open. I don't want to delete anything until i'm sure I'm going to have it all on the external drive. And i have no idea what to do next. I thought i could just make a folder on the external drive and drag the music there but thats not working, it won't drag. And I have audio books that i bought but can only listen to on the computer it seems i can't move them to the iphone! What a mess.
Can someone help!
Susan

I wrote this a bit prematurely. When I got around to syncing my ipod again that contained the games, they reappeared in itunes. Perhaps this will help someone else.

[Guide] Install and run Windows 7/8 from an external drive without using bootcamp (works for late 2012 iMacs with 3TB drive)

This is a copy of a post from my blog, you can also Read it on my blog...
Introduction
After I received my new iMac with a 3 TB Fusion Drive, I was disappointed when I realized that Bootcamp was not running on this model and prevented me from installing Windows on it. I wanted to take advantage of the powerful iMac hardware to play games but I couldn't.
There are a few ways of working around this limitation, but I found most of them quite complex and most of the time they required formatting the internal hard drive or repartitioning it and go for a brand new installation of Mac OS X. I was not comfortable with that.
But there is another way, and that is to install Windows on an external hard drive, using either USB or Thunderbolt. Personally I used a Lacie Rugged 1 TB drive that has both USB3 and Thunderbolt connectors. Both work very well.
This guide may interest you if:
You have an internal hard drive of more than 2TB and you can't run bootcamp at all (like late 2012 iMacs with a 3TB drive)
You have limited space or you don't want to dedicate disk space on your internal hard disk drive to a Windows installation
What this guide will make you do:
It will make you erase all your data from your external USB3/Thunderbolt hard drive
It will make you install Windows on your external USB3/Thunderbolt hard drive
It will make you install bootcamp drivers
What this will not make you do:
It will not make you modify anything on your internal Mac hard drive
It will not make you use or install the bootcamp assistant
It will not activate the Preference Pane for the default boot drive. You have to boot by pressing the ALT key to manually select your boot drive each tome you want to boot Windows.
What you'll need
An external hard drive with a USB3 and/or Thunderbolt connector. This drive will be formatted so ensure you saved your files before going further. You can use either an SSD drive or a classic hard drive.
A Windows 7 or 8 install DVD or ISO (check whether to install 32 or 64 bits versions based on your Bootcamp drivers) and the corresponding Windows serial number.
One of the following:
Mac OS X with a Windows 7 or 8 Virtual Machine (use VMWare Fusion or Parallels Desktop for example. Note: VMWare Fusion seems to have some issues with Thunderbolt and USB3. Plug your drive to a USB2 enclosure or hub to work around this -it worked for me-, or use another VM software) → Read the important note below
A PC running Windows 7 or 8 → Read the important note below
Windows AIK (free) running on your Virtual Machine or on your PC, or just the imagex.exe file (the rest of the Windows AIK package is not needed)
Download imagex.exe
Download Windows AIK (this download and installation is not required if you have already downloaded imagex.exe)
Bootcamp drivers for your Mac. You can get these either by running bootcamp from your Mac (Applications > Utilities > Bootcamp) or, if like me you have a 3TB drive and can't run bootcamp at all, use the direct download links here.
A USB stick to store your bootcamp drivers
IMPORTANT: If your Mac has a 64 bits processor, your Windows Virtual Machine on OSX, your Windows installation on your PC and your Windows DVD/ISO must also be in 64 bits!
Step by Step guide
Step 1: Get the install.wim file
If you have a Windows ISO file:
Mount the ISO
If you're on OS X: double click on the ISO file
If you're on on Windows 7: Use a software like Virtual Clone Drive (free)
If you're on Windows 8: double click on the ISO file
Open the mounted drive, then go to the "sources" folder and locate the "install.wim" file. Save this file to C:\wim\ on your Windows installation or virtual machine.
If you have a Windows DVD: open the "sources" folder on the DVD and locate the "install.wim" file. Save this file to C:\wim\ on your Windows installation or virtual machine.
IMPORTANT: If instead of a "install.wim" file, you have "install.esd", you can not continue this step by step guide. And an ESD file can not be converted into a WIM file. So you must get a version of the Windows installation DVD/ISO that has an install.wim file.
Step 2: Clean, partition and format your external hard drive
On your Windows installation or virtual machine, plug in your external hard drive (can be plugged using USB2, USB3 or Thunderbolt at this stage)
Open the command prompt in administrator mode (cmd.exe). To run it in administrator mode, right click on cmd.exe > Run as admin.
Type the following and hit enter to open the disk partitioner utility:
diskpartType the following and hit enter to list your drives:
list disk
This will display a list of disks mounted on your computer or virtual machine. Make sure your drive is listed here before you continue.Identify the disk ID of your external hard drive. Replace # by your real external disk ID in the command below:
select disk #Clean all partitions by typing the following (warning: this will erase all data from your external drive!):
clean
Create the boot parition by typing the following followed by the enter key:
create partition primary size=350
This will create a 350MB partition on your external driveFormat the partition in FAT32 by typing the following:
format fs=fat32 quick
Set this partition to active by typing:
active
Assign a letter to mount this partition. We will use letter B in our example. If B is already used on your PC, replace B by any other available letter:
assign letter=b
Windows will detect a new drive and probably display a pop-up. Ignore that.Create the Windows installation partition using all the remaining space available on the external drive by typing the following:
create partition primary
Format the new partition in NTFS:
format fs=ntfs quick
Assign a letter to mount this partition. We will use letter O in our example. If O is already used on your PC, replace O by any other available letter:
assign letter=o
Windows will detect a new drive and probably display a pop-up. Ignore that.Exit the disk partitioner utility by typing:
exit
Step 3: Deploy the Windows installation image
Still using the command prompt in admin mode (you didn't close it, did you? ), locate the imagex.exe file mentioned in the "What you'll need" section and access its folder. In our example, we have put this file in C:\imagex\imagex.exe
Type the following and hit enter (remember to replace o: with the letter you have chosen in the previous step):
imagex.exe /apply C:\wim\install.wim 1 o:
This will take some time. The Windows installation image is being deployed to your external driveOnce done, type the following to create the boot section (remember to replace o: and b: with the letters you've chosen in the previous step):
o:\windows\system32\bcdboot o:\windows /f ALL /s b:
If you get an error message saying that you can't run this program on your PC, then most probably you are running on a 32 bits installation of windows and you're trying to deploy a 64 bits install. This means you did not read the important notes in the beginning of this guide
If you get an error message on the options that can be used with the BCDBOOT command, then it's because you're installing Windows 7, and the /f option is not supported. If that is the case, remove /f ALL from the command and retry.
Step 4: Boot from your external drive and install Windows
Plug in your external drive:
If you've done all the previous steps from a Windows PC, unplug your external drive from your PC and plug it to your Mac, either on a USB3 or a Thunderbolt port.
If you've done all the previous steps from your Mac using a Virtual Machine, ensure the external drive is plugged in to a USB3 or Thunderbolt port. Using USB2 should also work but you'll get very poor performance so I don't recommend doing that.
Reboot your Mac and once the bootup sound is over, immediately press the ALT (option) key and release it only when the boot drives selection screen appears. If you did not get the boot drives selection screen, reboot and try again. The timing to press the ALT (option) key is quite short. It must not be too early or too late.
On the boot selection screen, choose "Windows" using the arrow keys on your keyboard, then press enter.
The Windows installation starts. Follow the on-screen instructions as normal. The installation program will restart your computer one or 2 times. Don't forget to press ALT (option) right after the bootup sound, and boot on Windows again each time to continue the installation.
Step 5: Install bootcamp drivers
Once the Windows installation is complete, plug in the USB stick where you stored the bootcamp drivers (see "what you'll need" section), open it and right click on "setup.exe" and select "Run as admin". Follow the on-screen instructions.If you have an error saying that you can't run this program on this PC, obviously you have installed a 32 bits version of Windows and the bootcamp drivers for your Mac are made for a 64 bits version. You have to restart the whole guide and make sure to get a 64 bits version of Windows this time!
Once the bootcamp drivers are all installed, reboot and press ALT (option) after the bootup sound to boot on Windows again. And Voilà, you have Windows installed on your USB3/Thunderbolt drive running on your Mac.
Now each time you want to boot on Windows, press and hold the ALT (option) key after the startup sound and select "Windows", then press Enter.

Hi i'm trying to follow your guide, I installed windows 8 on bootcamp to do it planning to remove it after the operation is done, but i get stuck at part 3: every command i give to imagex i get a pop-up ftom windws asking how do I want to open this kind of file install.wim and imagex does nothing, what do i have to do to stop those pop-ups?

Format and partition external drive if you want dual use Mac / PC

I had purchased from the Apple store in France a portable hard drive Iomega eGO USB 2.0/FireWire ov 250 Go capacity (P/N 31713900; Model: RPHD-C; S/N: FEAJ02011V)
Originally formatted HFS+, it would mount on any of my Mac desktops with Firewire, easily on the iMac using USB and with great difficulty on the iBook with the two USB plugs (together). It did not mount on any windows PC I had used for tests (so reformatting it FAT(32) or NTFS was *not an option).
I had reformatted it FAT32 using the iMac under mac OS 10.5 for use on multiple computers including Windows PC's. The drive would now accept to:
Mount on the iMac and iBook using Firewire
Mount on the iMac using USB, but it will NOT:
1 - Mount on the iBook using USB, nor
2 - Mount on any Windows PC using USB
The solution was found at the office with our IT helpdesk.
Whether I format it FAT 32 or NTFS (using the Paragon NTFS for mac OS X 10.5) on my iMac under OS 10.5, including when I do the same on another external drive than the Iomega, the PC would not recognise it while it would always mount on a Mac and it was even impossible on the PC to reformat it. The solution is (at least in windows world), you need to (1) format the drive, AND (2) partition the drive, even if this involves creating a single partition. Using Disk Utility of the Mac, I had only formatted the drive and not partitioned it into a single partition and Disk utility did not request that from me. The drive as prepared was perfectly usable on any Mac anyway.
The cure was to go back to the imac which had formatted it, mount it (it mounts), (1) reformat and (2) partition, using a single partition.
Then, the drive would instantly be recognised on the PC as a F drive, whether under FAT 32 or under NTFS.
The blame is in me and on the Apple Drive utility which did not help me (trust it would have been worse in windows world, but this is a bad mark on disk utility)
My suggestion to Apple would be that Disk Utilisty should tell us, once we have formatted a drive (HFS+, FAT 32 or NTFS using Parangon) that we are not done yet and still must create the partition(s), even if we only need one partition.
HTH

Hi Michel-Ange
You are talking to other user like yourself here and not Apple. If you wish to make a suggestion to Apple, I suggest you do it at this site - http://www.apple.com/feedback/macosx.html
Allan

Automount and external drives and phones...

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