Best External hard drive for 2011 macbook air

i recently recieved a 2011 macbook air and heard that it is easier on the computer to use an external hard drive
if this is true what would be the best reasonably priced one to buy?
thanks

http://www.hgst.com/external-drives/mobile/touro-mobile-pro
This I have found is a very good "bang for the buck" drive. 7200 RPM drive, and USB 3.0, if later you can advantage of it. If you want anything faster, you will have to raise your budget quite a bit going with a Thunderbolt drive, in which case I would recommend the Seagate GoFlex.
You may also want to consider a LaCie's Rugged Triple in 500 GB 7200 RPM configuration, and use the $29.00 Thunderbolt-Firewire adapter.
http://www.lacie.com/us/products/product.htm?id=10553

Similar Messages

I need to buy an external hard drive for my MacBook Air as it is almost full. Which one should I buy?

Do I need to buy an Apple external Hard Drive for my MacBook Air?

There is no such thing as an Apple hard drive, ...Apples doesnt make same.
avoid western digital if possible.
Yes, having an external HD is necessary for data backups and keeping large media files for packing around etc.
you need data redundancy.
best options for the price, and high quality HD:
Quality 1TB drives are $50 per TB on 3.5" or $65 per TB on 2.5"
Perfect 1TB for $68
http://www.amazon.com/Toshiba-Canvio-Portable-Hard-Drive/dp/B005J7YA3W/ref=sr_1_ 1?ie=UTF8&qid=1379452568&sr=8-1&keywords=1tb+toshiba
Nice 500gig for $50. ultraslim perfect for use with a notebook
http://www.amazon.com/Toshiba-Canvio-Portable-External-Drive/dp/B009F1CXI2/ref=s r_1_1?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1377642728&sr=1-1&keywords=toshiba+slim+500gb
Best small HD for the money:
2.5" USB portable High quality BEST FOR THE COST, Toshiba "tiny giant" 2TB drive (have several of them, LOT of storage in a SMALL package) $117
http://www.amazon.com/Toshiba-Canvio-Connect-Portable-HDTC720XK3C1/dp/B00CGUMS48 /ref=sr_1_4?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1379182740&sr=1-4&keywords=2tb+toshiba
*This one is the BEST portable external HD available that money can buy:
HGST Touro Mobile 1TB USB 3.0 External Hard Drive $88
http://www.amazon.com/HGST-Mobile-Portable-External-0S03559/dp/B009GE6JI8/ref=sr _1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1383238934&sr=8-1&keywords=HGST+Touro+Mobile+Pro+1TB+USB+3.0+7 2 00+RPM
Most storage experts agree on the Hitachi 2.5"
Hitachi is the winner in hard drive reliability survey:
Hitachi manufacturers the safest and most reliable hard drives, according to the Storelab study. Of the hundreds of Hitachi hard drives received, not a single one had failed due to manufacturing or design errors. Adding the highest average lifespans and the best relationship between failures and market share, Hitachi can be regarded as the winner.

What is the best External Hard Drive for a Macbook Leopard 10.5.8? I need more memory for documents, pictures, videos, and music. Thanks!

What is the best External Hard Drive for a Macbook Leopard 10.5.8? I need more memory for documents, pictures, videos, and music. Thanks!

Hi, does your MacBook have Firewire, or just USB?
FW is far faster if you have that.
Avoid Bus powered ones.
http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/firewire/1394/USB/EliteAL/eSATA_FW800_FW400_USB
USB only...
http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/firewire/usb/eliteclassic

Advice on how to format an external hard drive for a MacBook Air

I have an external USB hard drive plugged into a 64GB MacBook Air. How should I format the hard drive so that when I run out of room on the small 64 GB SSD drive on the MacBook Air, it will start putting some iTunes or other files onto the external hard drive? I only put iTunes and other small music files on the MacBook Air in order to save room. I do have iTunes set for iCloud.

You cannot format a drive so that files will be automatically put on that drive when you run out of room on another drive. Transferring the files must be done specifically by you. You will need to learn how to manage free space on the SSD because 64 GBs is a bit small for much more than OS X.
Drive Partition and Format
1. Open Disk Utility in your Utilities folder.
2. After DU loads select your hard drive (this is the entry with the mfgr.'s ID and size) from the left side list. Click on the Partition tab in the DU main window.
3. Under the Volume Scheme heading set the number of partitions from the drop down menu to one. Click on the Options button, set the partition scheme to GUID then click on the OK button. Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Partition button and wait until the process has completed.
4. Select the volume you just created (this is the sub-entry under the drive entry) from the left side list. Click on the Erase tab in the DU main window.
5. Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Security button, check the button for Zero Data and click on OK to return to the Erase window.
6. Click on the Erase button. The format process can take up to several hours depending upon the drive size.

What is the best external hard drive for mac book air?

Hey,
I'm trying to decide on a hard drive for my air, I don't need a great deal of extra storage, and I also don't wanna break the bank. Any suggestions?
Thank You!!

I'm using a Western Digital "My Passport" (500GB). I think I paid around $70 for it a couple of years ago. It's very small (about the size of a pack of cigarettes, but thinner). An aluminum housing that looks similar to Mac casing.
I'm just in the process of installing my new MacAir 11 and I have the drive plugged in. Seems to be working fine. Google it for pricing. They also make a 320GB drive that is slightly cheaper.

What is the best external hard drive for a macbook pro?

I have a lot of music, pictures, and software like Massive, Logic Pro 9 and FireStudio. Can the software be backed up to an external hard drive as well?

There is no best drive. None is better than the other.

How to use an external hard drive on a MacBook Air?

Hi there.
Recently I bought a portable USB external hard drive for my MacBook Air due to my full startup disk. I also bought multiple disks for the hard drive. I inserted the disk, hooked up the USB, and did everything properly. When I first hooked it up, I lost all internet files that I had saved. All images, videos and downloads (such as Minecraft and other gaming downloads) from the internet were gone and unable to find.
Now, I don't want to make the wrong move and lose all of my internet files again, so I am asking how to transfer files SAFELY to the USB without any files being deleted. I tranfered files before, but they were just short cuts to the original file, so I am also asking how to fix that as well. My Dad was a computer technician, although he didn't work for Apple, so he doesn't know how to use the USB.
I've tried everything to find my internet files, but nothing. If there is a way to get them back, I'd be glad if you shared that with me. My dock files aren't working due to this insanely full startup disk, so I'd appreciate it if you could tell me ASAP how to use the USB, how to SAFELY transfer files without them turning into shortcuts, and how to get my internet files back.
Thank you very much.
P.s My OS X version is 10.8.3 (Not with Mountain Lion)

You cannot format a drive so that files will be automatically put on that drive when you run out of room on another drive. Transferring the files must be done specifically by you. You will need to learn how to manage free space on the SSD because 64 GBs is a bit small for much more than OS X.
Drive Partition and Format
1. Open Disk Utility in your Utilities folder.
2. After DU loads select your hard drive (this is the entry with the mfgr.'s ID and size) from the left side list. Click on the Partition tab in the DU main window.
3. Under the Volume Scheme heading set the number of partitions from the drop down menu to one. Click on the Options button, set the partition scheme to GUID then click on the OK button. Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Partition button and wait until the process has completed.
4. Select the volume you just created (this is the sub-entry under the drive entry) from the left side list. Click on the Erase tab in the DU main window.
5. Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Security button, check the button for Zero Data and click on OK to return to the Erase window.
6. Click on the Erase button. The format process can take up to several hours depending upon the drive size.

Best External Hard Drives for MacBook

I have been doing some research on the External Hard Drives for the MacBook and have been getting mixed advise about the best one for the Macbook. I'm wondering if anyone with actual experience and knowledge with External Hard Drives and the MacBook could offer any advice on one I should look into.

You are going to get a bazillion answers and little agreement so be prepared.
An external drive is two components, case and drive. If you buy a generic no-name you have no clue about what's in the case or what the drive is. Even if you buy a name brand like Western Digital or Seagate you still can't be totally sure. Would WD put a Toshiba drive in their external case? Probably not but you still don't necessarily know which model WD you are getting.
I approach it two ways. For archival backups I build my own buying the case and drive to meet my needs. OWC is my usual source. For expansion and usage I tend to buy name brand externals. At the moment I have several Seagate FreeAgent drives. What I don't do is make drive purchases based on price - that's a great way to buy a drive that will fail just when you need it.

I have a 2007 macbook and I am wondering what is the best external hard drive for my Mac?

What is the best external hard drive for a 2007 Macbook?

The Apple USB superdrive would be a great choice for you, ( http://store.apple.com/ca/product/MD564ZM/A/apple-usb-superdrive?fnode=5f ) I am not certain but I am pretty sure that it has the same form factor as the MacMini (Not thickness but all the other dimenetions) so it fits just under and looks like an extension of your mac.

Best external hard drive for Macbook pro and Aperture

Hi, any recomendations for an external hard drive for the macbook pro and aperture. I was looking for approx 300Gb !
Many thanks
macphi

Personally I have had poor luck with LaCie Big Disk peformance and support and don't recommend LaCie. However I do recognize that my sample of one is statistically insignificant.
The eSATA concept is interesting, but bleeding tech edge at the moment. For a solid solution that works now I recommend FW800 (forget USB) and RAID 0 technology. I have had great success with OWC and just bought their least expensive (in $ per GB) 640 GB FW800 US$370 RAID O drive setup: <http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Other%20World%20Computing/ME8R7640GB16/>.
Just this week OWC introduced RAID 0 +1 drives that have RAID 0 speeds but also provide mirror backups. Perhaps the very best solution but pricey.
EDIT: If you bought a 15" MBP instead of the 17" you forever lack FW 800. Go for a FW 800 or an eSATA Express Card solution when available. You could buy an OWC drive now and jusr run it FW 400 until you get an Express Card FW800 port. The OWC drive came with ports and cables for both FW 800 and FW 400.
-Allen Wicks

What is the best external hard drives for macbook pro?

I am looking to buy an external hard drive for my macbook pro urgently.
I was intending to purchase a time capsule but am really concerned with the reliability concerns of the time capsules where they stop working after 6 months to 18 months as posted on various forums.
I was considering purchasing a western digital external hard drive but they also receive a lot of negative feedback.
I have never used firewire previously but am interested in getting feedback as to how useful forum readers find this feature.
In terms of size am looking for 1TB approx.
Thanks in advance for your assistance as i need to purchase one immediately and i do not have time to research fully. Make, model number and approximate cost would be very helpful as well as where i could purchase hard drive in london. I am more concerned with quality rather than cost.

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Can anyone make a recommendation on the purchase of an external hard drive for my Macbook Pro? I am currently using OS 10.6.8 because I can't upgrade until I clean out my start up disc space. I have a ton of pictures to transfer. Thanks!

Can anyone make a recommendation on the purchase of an external hard drive for my Macbook Pro? I am currently using OS 10.6.8 because I can't upgrade until I clean out my start up disc space. I have a ton of pictures to transfer.Thanks!

best options for the price, and high quality HD:
Quality 1TB drives are $50 per TB on 3.5" or $65 per TB on 2.5"
Perfect 1TB for $68
http://www.amazon.com/Toshiba-Canvio-Portable-Hard-Drive/dp/B005J7YA3W/ref=sr_1_ 1?ie=UTF8&qid=1379452568&sr=8-1&keywords=1tb+toshiba
Nice 500gig for $50. ultraslim perfect for use with a notebook
http://www.amazon.com/Toshiba-Canvio-Portable-External-Drive/dp/B009F1CXI2/ref=s r_1_1?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1377642728&sr=1-1&keywords=toshiba+slim+500gb
2.5" USB portable High quality BEST FOR THE COST, Toshiba "tiny giant" 2TB drive (have several of them, LOT of storage in a SMALL package) $117
http://www.amazon.com/Toshiba-Canvio-Connect-Portable-HDTC720XK3C1/dp/B00CGUMS48 /ref=sr_1_4?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1379182740&sr=1-4&keywords=2tb+toshiba
*This one is the BEST portable external HD available that money can buy:
HGST Touro Mobile 1TB USB 3.0 External Hard Drive $88
http://www.amazon.com/HGST-Mobile-Portable-External-0S03559/dp/B009GE6JI8/ref=sr _1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1383238934&sr=8-1&keywords=HGST+Touro+Mobile+Pro+1TB+USB+3.0+7 2 00+RPM
Most storage experts agree on the Hitachi 2.5"
Hitachi is the winner in hard drive reliability survey:
Hitachi manufacturers the safest and most reliable hard drives, according to the Storelab study. Of the hundreds of Hitachi hard drives received, not a single one had failed due to manufacturing or design errors. Adding the highest average lifespans and the best relationship between failures and market share, Hitachi can be regarded as the winner.

Is there a way to access my iTunes Library, which is stored on a (PC) External Hard Drive, on a MacBook Air (through an Apricorn Universal Hard Drive Adapter), without transferring the music files off of the external hard drive?

Is there a way to access my iTunes Library, which is stored on a (PC) External Hard Drive, on a MacBook Air (through an Apricorn Universal Hard Drive Adapter), without transferring the music files off of the external hard drive?
In other words, because the MacBook Air only has 120 gbs of hard drive space & my old hard drive, from a Lenovo, has 500 gbs of hard drive space (and I have over 120 gbs of music), I’m looking to manage my iTunes music from the external hard drive permanently. Upon attempting to access the iTunes library held on the external hard drive the following message comes up: “The iTunes Library.itl file is locked, on a locked disk, or you do not have write permission for this file”. Is there a way to get around this?
Any advice would be greatly appreciated, thanks so much!

You will have to engage a split library which means you will have to start answering questions on this forum because you will need to learn a lot about how iTunes works in order not that have a big mess at the end of it all. It also won't be easy when the time comes to relocate it all to different drives.
You can go to advanced preferences and turn off organize media and copy to items to media folder when adding items to library. Next read about how to selectively consolidate items to the external drive.
Sept. 2010, Consolidate selected content - https://discussions.apple.com/thread/2589812 and April 2014, https://discussions.apple.com/message/25414357
"...selected the new tracks directly in iTunes, Control-clicked on the selection, and saw that now you can consolidate selected items." - http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=20090919000326840
Remember that when you start iTunes without the external drive turned on iTunes will present you with a bunch of broken links. If you have automatic downloads enabled with iCloud you may have to turn that off to prevent iTunes from repopulating your drive trying to deal with those "missing" tracks.
If you add tracks in bunches to iTunes and want them to go to different media folders you will need to either add them by holding down the option key while dragging if the desired media folder is not the one set in preferences, or by changing the media folder in preferences. Changing media folder preferences only applies to new files added, not old ones.
Okay, I am going to stop typing because you might just reply to me, "Oh, okay, forget it," and I don't need the exercise.
What are the iTunes library files? - http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1660
More on iTunes library files and what they do - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITunes#Media_management
What are all those iTunes files? - http://www.macworld.com/article/139974/2009/04/itunes_files.html
Where are my iTunes files located? - http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1391

What is the best external hard drive for the MAC Book Pro with Retina?

What is the best external hard drive for the MAC Book Pro with Retina?
I was looking at WD MY PASSPORT FOR MAC and Toshiba. I want something that will work best with time capsule! Suggestions on the best external hard drive would be greatly appreciated!!!

A Time Machine backup drive should be substantially larger than the system drive. If you have a 128 or 256 GB SSD then a 1 TB drive will suffice. If you have a 512 GB SSD then a 2 TB drive will suffice. As leroydouglas indicated any brand other than WD will do.
For 1 TB drives PlotinusVeritas gives some great suggestions here:
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5602141?tstart=0
A 2 TB drive sold by Apple:
http://store.apple.com/us/product/H9378ZM/A/lacie-2tb-usb-30-porsche-design-p923 3-desktop-hard-drive
$130
A 2 TB drive just as good for only $92.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Toshiba-Canvio-Basics-3-0-USB-2-TB-Portable-Hard-Drive-M odel-HDTB220XK3CA-/231162655273

Can I use my 160gb iPod classic as an external hard drive for my MacBook?

Can I use my 160gb iPod classic as an external hard drive for my MacBook?

That link seems to be broken. It does normally lead to a solution. For the time being go to
http://www.google.com/search?q=ipod+classic+disk+mode
Let your mouse hover over the link until you see the option appear on the right to view the cached version Google contains:
Putting iPod devices with a Click Wheel into Disk Mode
If necessary, verify that your iPod has a Click Wheel.
Before placing the iPod into Disk Mode, verify that it is charged.
Toggle the Hold switch on and off (set it to Hold, then turn it off again.)
Press and hold the Menu and Select buttons for at least six seconds, until the Apple logo appears.
When the Apple logo appears, release the Menu and Select buttons and immediately press and hold the Select and the Play/Pause buttons until the Disk Mode screen appears.
Connect the iPod to your computer; the screen on the iPod will should say "Do not disconnect".
If you are having difficulty putting your iPod into Disk Mode, set it on a flat surface. Make sure that the finger pressing the Select button is not touching the Click Wheel. Also make sure that you are pressing the Play/Pause button toward the outside of the Click Wheel and not near the center. If you are still unable to put your iPod into Disk Mode, use one finger from one hand to press the Select button, and one finger from the other hand to press the Play/Pause button.
If you have an older iPod model, without a Click Wheel
Before placing the iPod into Disk Mode, verify that it has a charge.
Toggle the Hold switch on and off (set it to Hold, then turn it off again.)
Press and hold the Play/Pause and Menu buttons until the Apple/iPod logo appears, then release them. This resets iPod. When you reset iPod, all your music and data files are saved, but some customized settings may be lost.
When the Apple logo appears, immediately press and hold the Previous and Next buttons until the Disk Mode screen appears.
Connect the iPod to your computer; the screen on the iPod should say "Do not disconnect".
If you have an iPod nano (6th generation)
Before placing the iPod into Disk Mode, verify that it has a charge.
Reset the device by pressing the Sleep and Volume Down buttons simultaneously until the display turns black. This should take about eight seconds.
When the display turns black, hold down the Volume Down and Volume Up buttons simultaneously until the device enters Disk mode.

Best External hard drive for 2011 macbook air

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