Booting up off External Firewire Drive

Hi
I just got a LaCie mini 250GB Firewire drive, which works very nicely and certainly improves performance. However, I find when I do a cold start that it usually defaults to booting up off the mini's internal drive. This is when the mini has been shutdown using the shutdown software command, but the LaCie is still left switched on.
I understand I can force the LaCie by using a key on start-up, but I am not present when doing the start-up (it's being used as Home Theater setup).
Anyone got any ideas how I can always force the external drive to be used unless it absolutely can't be found?
Thanks
Ian

Something you might want to try, although its a workaround and has no guarentees:
It seems that the only way you can boot externally is a warm restart, right? So, make an applescript to restart your machine 30 seconds after it is launched. Place that script as an application in your startup items for the internal drive. Theoretically, the mini starts from the Int HD, auto-logs in, runs the apple script application. If - after thirty seconds - no user input has occured, it restarts the mini. At this point, it should just do what its told - use the external. If you need help with the scripting, just shout (or post here).

Similar Messages

Booting off external firewire drive

Hi Ive cloned my internal imac drive using superduper.
Inside the startup application i can now see my external drive as bootable.
I am trying to boot off the external drive TARGET disk mode. Is this correct to get the os to boot off the external FW drive?

Hello Joe.
You don't use Target disk mode to do so. When connected, you can select the external firewire drive to boot from via System Preferences > Startup Disk or use the Startup Manager during startup or restart.
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=106178

Can I boot from an external Firewire drive?

I have restored my internal system drive (27GB) to a 100GB partition on a 300GB external FW drive (as a backup).
Using System preferences I changed the startup disk to be the clone & rebooted to test.
No start and the only way to get going again was to turn the FW drive off & reboot.
Is it possible to boot from a FW drive?
Should a drive as described be bootable?
Any thoughts will be appreciated.
John

Thank you all for your input.
After some trial & error (& little sleep last night) I have made some progress:
Further research suggested that:
1. there may be a hardware issue with my Ex FW case (it has a Prolific PL-3507 chip)
2. Tiger (10.4.x) behaves differently from Panther (10.3.x) and possibly different versions of Tiger may behave differently
Also I have previously successfully used DU to move my OS from a 30GB to 120GB disk (both internal drives) under 10.3.9. This disk will boot when placed in a ext FW case.
I concluded that under 10.3.9 at least my case was OK & Apple DU was OK when run from the boot volume.
I also checked the clone made using DU under 10.4.3 by taking the HDD out of the FW case & installing it internally in my Mac - it wouldn't boot so DU hadn't made a bootable clone - it was never going to boot internally or externally. Ever.
Next step - SuperDuper! - worked perfectly - backed up & booted no fuss, no worries.
This confirms that the Prolific PL-3507 chip will boot an external FW disk under OS X 10.4.3.
I then referred to Lee Cullens' posts as quoted by Matthew Whiting (with a link above in this topic).
Lee has the answer (at least for my hardware/software configuration). For Apple's DU to produce a bootable clone it cannot be run from the disk which is being cloned (ie 3 volumes are needed
1st to boot from & run DU from
2nd to be cloned (the vloume to be backed up)
3rd to be colned onto - the backup
I tried DU from the boot disk again to "prove" it wouldn't work. While it appeared to clone correctly Permissions were all messed up & after over an hour of "Repairing Permissions" I gave up. The volume wouldn't boot even though system preferences saw it as a bootable volume.
I then ran DU from another volume (the one made using SuperDuper!). After verification (but not repairing permissions as I didn't want to potentially waste another hour!) it booted fine from the ext FW drive. I did however uncheck "Ignore Ownership" after Cmd-I on the volume from the desktop.
I conclude:
My hardware is OK (& probably others who may have similar issues)
Apple DU can make a bootable clone which will work on an ext FW drive PROVIDING 3 volumes are used - boot with DU on, from & to. Suitable for a bootable backup but a bit fiddly ( also free & regularly updated by Apple)
SuperDuper does the same job with less fuss (don't need a CD or 3rd volume + other features). As noted by Matthew basic cloning is free but I think the shareware cost will be worthwhile ($US27.95)
SuperDuper! here: http://www.shirt-pocket.com/SuperDuper/SuperDuperDescription.html
Thanks to all for their input.
I now have an answer that I'm more than happy with.
John

Can the iMac G3 with Panther boot from an external FireWire drive?

It does have firewire. I am worried that if my internal HD fails, I am going to be SOL. Sooo... If I install just Panther (full retail) on a new internal HD, will i be able to boot from it? How about if it is on an external FW drive? I DO NOT have the original install disks that came with the computer.

If I install just Panther (full retail) on a new internal HD, will i be able to boot from it?
Yes. Verify that the computer's firmware is up to date first.
How about if it is on an external FW drive?
Yes.
(29546)

Booting OSs off external disk drive.

Hi I have a 15" MBP (the old type) with a disk functional disk drive. I want to install windows on an external hard drive to be booted off the MBP. However the external disk drive does not like any OS CDs other than MAC OS X ones. It tells me I can boot but when I try it says "Missing Operating System". Is there a way to boot windows (or Ubuntu) from an external disk drive?

Not as is. Neither OS will boot from an external drive without modification. Visit Ubuntu's web site for help with it. You should be able to find some articles via Google on how to modify Windows to boot from an external drive.
However, if you want to install Windows from a Windows installer disc you cannot do so from an external optical drive.

IMac won't boot with SATA external firewire drive attached

I have an 1T Hitachi SATA drive enclosed in a Macally firewire enclosure. If it is attached either in series with other IDE firewire drives or directly, my iMac will boot only to the Apple icon and will not engage the gear icon. If I disconnect the drive the iMac will boot normally with all the other IDE firewire drives attached. I've troubleshot with both Macally and Hitachi, received a replacement enclosure and have an RMA from Hitachi. Before I send the Hitachi back with the possibility of a replacement not fixing the problem, I am asking whether there is a known problem with external SATA drives in particular. TIA. -Dave

I have the same problem exactly but with two firewire 800 drives attached. Both are LaCie d2 500 gb drives. I have tried each one as the first in the series with no luck. I have not tried to connect with any other type of cable.

Booting from an external firewire drive

I bought an external hard drive (Western Digital, 320 gb, firewire). First, I erased the disk and formatted it as Mac Os Extended (Journaled).
I cloned my internal drive (using SuperDuper) on to the new external drive. My goal is to have an alternate bootable drive in case my internal drive fails. However, it will not boot on it even though it may be selected as the startup disk. And will not come up as an option when holding down the option key while booting. I've read about a similar problem that was posted but the solution confused me. Can you give me a solution to this problem?

First you should prep the drive correctly as follows:
Extended Hard Drive Preparation
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. Set the number of partitions from the dropdown menu (use 1 partition unless you wish to make more.) Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Partition button and wait until the volume(s) mount on the Desktop.
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 Options button, select the button for Zero Data (single pass) and click on OK to return to the Erase window.
6. Click on the Erase button. The format process may take up to several hours depending upon the drive size.
Steps 4-6 are optional but should be used on a drive that has never been formatted before, if the format type is not Mac OS Extended, if the partition scheme has been changed, or if a different operating system (not OS X) has been installed on the drive.
After formatting has completed select the volume you must created from the left side list, then click on the Restore tab in the DU main window. Drag the new volume to the Destination field. Drag your startup volume from the left side list to the Source field. Click on the Restore button.
After cloning has completed quit DU. Open Startup Disk preferences, select the new volume and click on the Restart button. Your computer should boot from the external drive.

Booting os x from *partitioned* external firewire drive?

Hi all,
my internal hard disk (on a 12" powerbook G4 867 mhz running osx tiger 10.4.10) has started acting weird (many people are reporting failing hard drives, and I'm assuming mine is failing too), so I'm preparing for replacing it with a new hard drive.
I've backed up the drive to an external firewire drive (LaCie portable 80 GB firewire drive "Design by F.A. Porsche") using Carbon Copy Cloner with the option 'make bootable' selected.
PROBLEM: I can't boot OS X using my clone on the external drive.
I'VE TRIED:
1. holding down Command-Option-Shift-Delete while booting to bypass the internal drive. (This didn't work: I saw an os 9 icon blinking/alternating with a question mark for a while, and then the computer booted from the internal hard disk.)
2. holding down Option to select the external drive in Startup Manager. (Didn't work either: Startup Manager opened fine, but only showed my internal drive volume. I tried clicking the 'rescan' button, but it couldn't find my external drive.)
3. SELECTING THE EXTERNAL DRIVE under Startup Disk in System Preferences. Note that the external drive volume *did show up* there. So under some conditions at least, the external volume is identified as a bootable volume. (This didn't work either, though: When I shut down the computer and booted up with the external drive connected, it still booted up from the internal drive.)
POSSIBLE EXPLANATION?
My external drive is partitioned into three partitions of different formats:
1. "Mac OS X Extended (Journaled)"
2. "Mac OS X Extended (Journaled)"
3. "MS-DOS File System (FAT32)"
The bootable volume is the first partition with the os x format.
Could my problem be caused by this partitioning of my external drive?
Either way, what to do?? I hope some of you savvy people out there can help me out.
Cheers,
Philip

Hi Philip,
My problem has been fixed, & I imagine it's the same for you...:
With the excellent help from Dave Nanian at shirtpocket.com - the developer of 'SuperDuper!' (thanks Dave - you rock!), the problem (as Michael suggested) is to do with the Partition Scheme of the drive.
If your drive was like my portable LaCie Porsche drive, it was FAT32-formatted for PC out of the box. This format has an underlying MBR (master boot record) partition-scheme. When re-partitioning a drive in 'Disk Utility', the original partition-scheme sticks, so if you simply re-partition the drive to Mac OS Extended, it will still have an MBR partition scheme... which Macs cannot boot from!
For a Power PC Mac to be able to boot from an external firewire drive, the drive MUST have an APM (Apple Partition Map) Partition Scheme underlying the Mac OS Extended partitions. To do this, click on the 'Options' button in 'Disk Utility' when on the 'Partition' page before partitioning. You will see the options:
GUID Partition Table (for Intel Macs... (n.b. Power PC's cannot boot from a GPT drive))
Apple Partition Map (to create a bootable drive for a Power PC Mac)
Master Boot Record (to create a bootable PC drive)
So.... to make your external drive bootable for your Powerbook G4, choose 'Apple Partition Map' in the 'Options' page prior to partitioning.
Special note about Intel Macs: Contrary to info supplied by Apple, an Intel Mac CAN boot from an APM-partitioned drive (this is why the OSX installer can be univerally bootable!), BUT, the problem is that the OSX installer will NOT let you install OSX-intel on an APM-partitioned drive....
You can, however, clone an Intel-Mac-OSX internal drive that has a GPT partition-scheme (using CCC or SuperDuper) to an external drive with APM, & the Intel Mac will still be able to boot from that clone...
The only real use for doing this, though, is if you want a multi-partitioned backup drive with separate bootable partitions for OSX-PPC & OSX-Intel machines. (Remember that a PPC machine cannot boot from a GTP-partion-scheme drive, hence the need to use APM in this instance seeing as the Partition Scheme applies to the entire drive (it can't be different for each partition.)
Good luck - let us know how you get on!
Jason

IMac 2.8Ghz + booting from external FireWire Drive

I was wondering if anyone has 'booted' from an external FireWire drive using the FireWire 400 port?
After going through the issue of reformatting my external drive with the GU-ID partitioning scheme, I found that the drive would mount on the FW400 port but wouldn't boot. In the end I used the FW800 port and the drive booted up first time. On my old PowerBook I could boot from both FW400 & FW800, does anyone know why FW400 doesn't work or is it my iMac?

If it mounts then you can install OSX or clone OSX and then boot from it. From what you are saying a bootable partition will boot on 400 just not on 800, which is quite odd, I concur.
Note that they are notorious for needing the right power supply and they all look identical - I had problems of recent with a triple extreme 1 TB on FW 800, and took it to LaCie (a mile from where I work) - they told me I was using the wrong power supply and gave me the right one free. When I got home I did have the right one in a pile with others. 4.2 A vs. 2.2 A and it worked great. And I have a spare free power supply.
I don't think drivers even enter into it at all with firewire, e.g. drive specific drivers.

Blue Screen Result When Installing To External Firewire Drive

I can't afford to have problems with programs not running on Leopard on my 17" G4 1.67 GHz 2 GB RAM PowerBook so I am trying to install it on an external Firewire drive. I was hoping to test out Leopard with certain applications by running it from the external drive.
The Firewire drive has two partitions, one has my backup clone of the PowerBook and the other just has files and about 35 GB of free space. The installation would be a new installation so none of the files that deal with login or Application Enhancer that are being talked about in other threads are an issue.
My first attempt to install brought up a blue screen after the installation restart. I left it there for about 30 minutes then powered off the PowerBook by holding down the power button. I started it again and held down the option key, picked the install disk as startup, went through the disk utility repair disk (found no problems). After that I picked the new install on the external from the startup preferences and it simply restarted to a blue screen. I left that one for about 20 minutes then powered down.
I went back to the Powerbook Tiger OS system, deleted all the installed folders on the external and tried a completely new install. Once again it went to the blue screen after the Leopard install restart. This time I left it overnight and this morning the display was dark and upon waking it up with a tap of the space bar was greeted by the bluescreen again.
I talked to my Apple hardware rep who knows the equipment that I am working with and we talked about all the steps I went through and he has no explanation why it won't work on the external.
I would love to hear from anyone that may have insight for this particular external FW drive installation perspective.

Joe-
Is the drive partitioned to APM? (Sorry I took Anton's reply to be yours.) What was the type fo partitioning onthe disk with the success? I am not knowledgable enough in those error messages on the system.log file, but one thought is - after the memory upgrade, did you clear the PRAM (long shot, but do it anyway)? The machine booting on one external Firewire drive (#2) implies the problem is with the external FW disk (#1) you are using. Some other people had the bus error, but with Time Machine. (Not to go on a tangent, but TM seems to have problems when the disk name has non-alphanumeric in it.)
Hoping someone who knows the syslog errors and the boot sequence will pipe in here.

My G4 won't boot off a firewire drive cloned from properly-booting drive

I've got a G4 that normally boots 10.3.9 off an external firewire drive. I cloned the drive onto a WesternDigital "MyBook" external hard drive, and connected it via firewire 400. I cloned the 10.3.9 boot drive using SuperDuper to a partition on this drive. But, the G4 refuses to boot off it when I choose it as a startup disk. I see (very briefly) the following
....couldn't read it.... @d/mac-io@7/ata-4@1f000/disk@0:5,\\:tbxi
anyone know what this is, why it won't boot off the clone, and how I can check whether the drive contains a proper 10.3.9 system and is set to be bootable?
Mike

Hi Mike-
How did you know?
I "Googled" it. It's been reported many times, and is included in a couple of reviews.
Problem is, "bootable" can be claimed in Mac's, as it will boot with Intel machines.......
Don't ya' just hate that?????
This review is from a writer for Mac-Centric.

Stupid question: force booting from external FireWire drive

My PowerBook is refusing to boot from it's hard drive (flashing ?/folder), which I'll be attempting to repair using DiskWarrior, etc.
But it's also not finding and booting from the OS X installed on my external FireWire drive (which it could do under normal circumstances). How do I force it to do that given that I'm unable to set the Start Up Volume in the normal manner?
PowerBook G4 17" 1.5GHz 512MB 80GB Mac OS X (10.3.6)

Dale,
Thanks for your response. I've been through the usual stuff as in your reference and I eventually got it to boot off the external HD by just leaving it long enough - it took maybe 10-15 minutes. I'm booted from it now. I hadn't thought of using the Startup Manager, but will try to remember next time.
As for the internal HD, it's looking like it's dead - neither Disk Warrior nor Data Rescue II seem to be able to see it. I tried Disk Utility from the external HD, but it doesn't see it and nor does the Profiler. Maybe it's just a loose connection internally. There is a noise coming from the PB from about just under the division between the left hand rest and the speaker. It sort of sounds like a disk continually being read or written - ie. a sort of very rapid clicking, but I don't think it's the HD. And I don't think it's the fan. Anyone with any ideas before I call AppleCare?
I did have a very similar problem a few weeks ago (http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=1465680#1465680), but Disk Warrior fixed it apparently with next to no problems. I was going to wipe the drive at the weekend & reinstall, but didn't get round to it in the end ... Fortunately I had a backup this time and was able to restore my user simply by copying it.

Is it possible to boot a G4 (pci graphics) from an external firewire drive?

I have a Lacie 250 gig bootable external firewire drive which is recognized on my Power PC G4 400 but I cannot get it to boot from this drive. The procedure works fine on my ibook... I looked into a possible firmware update but the apple site says no update is necessary for the G4 400/pci graphics...
Any suggestions?

There sure are some radically contradictory posts here! (This isn't typical, at least in this section of the Discussions, RMx2.)
Can anyone who has posted here (or might join in here) actually boot from a hard drive connected via USB? I just tested this with OS X and I can't. For some time now, the Discussions have been riddled with posts, whether 100% accurate or inaccurate, that Macs don't boot from USB drives, despite the seemingly conflicting info in the article that Don kindly referenced. (John Huber: Don't eat your words just yet, John!)
Here's my personal experience, for what it's worth... I have a rev.2 B&W G3 which recognizes, reads, and writes to drives via USB, but refuses to boot from them (I tested with OS X 10.3 and 10.4). I also have a QS 2002 G4 that yields the same results. The QS G4 will, however, boot from these drives via FW. I used a WiebeTech ComboDock for testing this with both USB and FW. I tested with two different hard drives, both of which are known to have stable, working versions of OS X on them.
My G3 running OS X 10.3.9 sees the USB-connected drives in the Startup Disk Preference Pane, but when I click to Restart after selecting the USB system folder there, I get a beachball (haven't seen that in awhile...) and have to Force Quit System Preferences. Console tells me that that it could not get open firmware information or set open firmware information, and that it can't touch or set System/Library/CoreServices/BootX, returning Error 1 running bless.
On the QS running Tiger, the USB OSs don't even appear in the Startup Disk Pane of Sys Prefs. I can see the USB drive(s) using the Startup Manager, but selecting them and restarting results in a hung startup to a spinning cog with a prohibitory sign on the screen...
I haven't tried playing around with open firmware NVRAM settings (and don't intend to, except perhaps for trying an NVRAM reset), nor have I attempted to boot to OS 9, reset the startup disk there, and attempt the boot again to the USB device in OS X and in OS 9, which I may try later on when I have a bit of time...
Gary
Message was edited by: Majordadusma

How do I back up my Boot Camp partition to external firewire drive?

I have a 15 GB Windows XP Boot Camp partition (FAT32). I want to back it up to a 120 GB external Firewire drive. (I know the backup won't be bootable). In OX X Disk Utility, I formatted the external drive as MS-DOS (FAT). I planned to do the backup using the Windows Backup utility.
However, when booted into WinXP, Windows will not recognize the external hard drive. I thought I might need to create a FAT32 partion of 32 GB or less on the external drive, but I apparently can't do this in OS X or Windows (since Windows doesn't recognize the drive).
Any suggestions on how to backup the Boot Camp partition will be appreciated. I'm mainly interested in preserving all programs and data. Ideally, a clone could be created that could be restored back to the original partition in bootable form, but from studying this and other forums, it dosn't seem to be easy to do this for a FAT32-formatted volume.

My goal was to create a bootable clone of my FAT32 Boot Camp partition, while at the same time increasing the size of the partition from 15 GB to 32 GB if possible. This is what I did:
1. As suggested in this thread, I used Disk Utility to create a disk image. I formatted it as MS-DOS (FAT), and made it 32 GB in size.
2. Used the Finder to copy all files from my 15 GB Windows XP partition to the new disk image.
The following steps were only to determine if the disk image is a viable backup:
3. Removed the internal hard drive with my original Win XP partition, and installed a new internal hard drive.
4. Used Boot Camp Assistant to create a 32 GB Boot Camp partition on the new internal drive.
5. Inserted my Win XP installation disk and started the Windows installation. Formatted the new partition as FAT32. (I used the long rather than the quick format method--not sure if this was necessary.)
6. Continued the Windows installation to the point of restarting the computer, at which time I used the Option key to boot back into OS X.
7. Used the Finder to copy all the files from the 32 GB disk image to the new Boot Camp partition. (This overwrote a few Windows files installed by the aborted Win XP installation.)
8. Restarted and used the Option key to select the new 32 GB Boot Camp Partition. Windows booted as usual with all files, programs, etc. from the original 15 GB partition. Windows did complain about "new hardware" and required a restart, but all appears normal.
This indicates that the disk image containing all the files from my original Boot Camp partition is a viable backup, and can be used to restore the partition if necessary. I'm not sure if formatting the disk image as MS-DOS (rather than Mac OS extended) was necessary, or not.

Can WinXP be loaded and booted from external firewire drive?

The subject line probably says it all but:
Does the recent firmware upgrade and/or BootCamp allow you to install WinXP on an external Firewire drive rather than partitioning the iMac Core Duo's internal drive?
Mike
Intel iMac Mac OS X (10.4.6)

The other problem is XP itself doesn't support booting from firewire. Even if someone could figure out how to install to an external from bootcamp, you would still have to contend with XP.
Glor

Booting up off External Firewire Drive

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