Can't copy files to external hard drive

I have had both my MacBook and external hard drive for over three years now, and have never had a problem. In the last week, my external hard drive stopped letting me copy files onto it. When you try to drag and drop it just comes up with the blocked symbol. I have tested this with other hard drives as well and keep getting the same error. I've read other forums where it seems the answer is just to reformat the hard drive to the correct format, but I've never had a problem before so it seems strange that the format would just suddenly change.
All suggestions welcome!

me to no problem until nowdays
and the file is movies 1080 so is one file 7-8-9-10 gb
the weird is i see the movie from memory stick
but i cant copy
i restared but i cant format the memory stick becouse i use it in windows
helppppppppppppp

Similar Messages

I can't copy files to External Hard Drive : Please help..

Evening,
I've just bought a Macbook and am just getting to grips with it. This is my first question on this forum...the first of many no doubt.
Problem I've got is that I can copy file's from an external hard drive on to the MAC but I can't go back the other way and copy file's from the MAC on to the external hard drive - it says 'New Folder cannot be modified'.
When I go into 'Ownership and Permission' of the external hard drive it says I can read only.
The Hard Drive is a Octigen USB 2.0 drive if that helps..
Any ideas?
Thanks for your help
R
Macbook Mac OS X (10.4.8)
Macbook Mac OS X (10.4.8)

How confident are you that MacFuse/ntfs-3g is a reliable option for ordinary humans? It is at version 0.2.2, not long out of beta, the FAQ mentions slow write performance and other rough edges (possibly fixed in the current version), and this is a comment by the author as of 1/11/07:
"Small disclaimer: Please note that MacFUSE is a complex piece of software, and it is a work in progress. We believe in releasing early and often, so we're releasing it now so that the community can help us to make it more robust."
I have no need for it whatsoever, but if I did, I would have concerns about using it for a backup drive.

(Error code -36) Can't delete files from external hard drive

So as I was copying files to my hard drive (Seagate Backup Plus Drive) my Macbook Pro went flat, and so the files obviously didn't get to finish copying. Now they're greyed out in my folder and when I try to move the files to the trash it comes up with this message:
"The Finder can’t complete the operation because some data in “-----” can’t be read or written.
(Error code -36)"
Does anyone know how I can fix this? I've tried a couple of different things and nothing has worked, and I don't wanna stuff around too much in case I lose everything.

Presumably you are using the Seagate as an external HD.
"my Macbook Pro went flat" means the MBP shut down or powered off suddenly for some reason?
If your Seagate was not properly ejected that would cause problems. You should run Disk Utility and Verify and Repair the Seagate, if needed. Then you should be able to deal with the uncompleted files.

Can't delete file from external hard drive

Hi,
There is a permition problem with my external hard drive (no time mashine on it!) - can't delete certain files.
I copied my documents on my external hard drive from previous computer with windows and later with linux system on it and there had been changed icons at certain folders previously. I mention this, becouse what linux did was that it locked the changed icon files and I couldn't delete them until I unlocked them manually. But at least it showed me that i don't have permition and i could change it. Well, now I mounted the disk on my new macbook and wanted to delete some files and it seems that there is the same problem with permition, at least it seems to happen with the same files. When I want to delete them, the system asks me for admin password, I give it allright, it makes the sound as if the folder was moved to trash but that's all. the folder is still there even after dismounting and restarting. I already checked the permitions and it says in the info that i can read and write with the file so it looks as if my rights were ok...
Please help, I desperatly need more space for new backup and can't get rid of the files I don't need any more...
Thank you for any sort of simple-ish advice
Message was edited by: brevon

Thanx for such qucik reply!!! The pages were great, it had an answer for my problem, but unfortunately it also involved me dealing with it only on the MacIntosh HD itself, not on mounted external drive I suppose... So it didn't work they say that there is an icon in the left corner indicating locked folder - I don't see any icon on it. It says you can untick the box to unlock the folder - there is no tick to be unticked. Finally, they say that if I don't have permition or rights I cannot delete it. But how do i change permittion which already says that i can read and write in it? So everything appears to be normal only I cannot delete it. there is not even any warnig telling me I don't have enough rights, it just requires the password and after me typing it in it makes the sound of scraping paper but does nothing more. I aslo had some problems with emptying Trash after being seemingly succesful with one file and had got so far to have them appear in the Trash (no clue how this one actully got there though..) I followd the advice and emptied the Trash with Terminal. The Folder is still there but it shows 0 Kb... So far so good BUT: It is still on the external drive, so I obviously only managed to copy it into the Trash!!! Phew, innit a bit too tight to poor owners, this macbook?? I want my rights back!

Can't open file on external hard drive?

Hi,
I'm using an external hard drive for mac backup and also to store photo files. I copied some photo files to the drive about two weeks ago and their icon appears, but when I want to open them, I get an error message: "The alias “...” can’t be opened because the original item can’t be found." There is also a small arrow on the icon. My other files can be opened okay.
What's also strange is that I found the icon of the external drive in the folder with the picture files, even though I did not drag it there (the main icon is till on my computer's desktop, where it should be.) That icon also has a small arrow on it. When I click on it, it opens and I can see my folders, but the photo folders with the arrow on it will still not open.
I tried ejecting the drive and reconnecting it, but it didn't help. Is there anything I can do to recover the missing photo files, or are they most likely gone? I have deleted these pictures from my computer hard drive. What should I do about the mysterious second external drive icon? Delete it or keep it? Can I somehow use it to restore the photo files?
Any help appreciated! Thanks!

The Hard Drive is a :
Toshiba Canvio® Connect 1TB Portable Hard Drive (Silver)
Model: HDTC710XS3A1
This one: http://www.staples.com/office/supplies/StaplesProductDisplay?langId=-1&storeId=1 0001&krypto=3zEkJ%2BPHCwJUtrlzjGByIaVT405Hn%2BOkggwamseD1O2Y0FHbJ9AUp%2FvPow7k22 XRWnJ6JpaVN8kRgl1%2FsFLgpeXF3MELtwm2GBihw8f7efXGqDPuH1gOcMRylnlmBw9gsk%2BTp1l7y9 CIe9KKQs5NR6dOV3HVJyJoGFWpJuhiI4ebeznLAndHONOpAQH7BG04MKAdFPnSHdRzYEBcRoM%2FVHQM k2PSq4vj%2F684ZdSvLVCllSq4ffM7sqpFRf0VO825mlCiumRBMCpX4RLzBCDAjoVpsvSrfRAuJkk4ZW NwBP3Qfzok8RiYCyj3rmcmGc1iFsFS6dhKjH9xnnhEkb5%2Bag%3D%3D
I copied the photos by dragging and dropping them into the folder on the external drive. I highlighted them all and dragged them together, then clicked "Arrange by Name", so I would find them. As the folders were visible, I assumed they were copied correctly, however I'm not sure I actually opened one to make sure.
Other than the photo folder I have the hard drive connected to Time Machine and it automatically backs up files. I still have about 700MB of space left on the drive.
I used my Mac (disk utility) to format the drive, not the software that came with it, as someone on this forum recommended. Format is: Mac OS Extended (Journaled). So far, it had been working great.
Just looked at Disk Utility and it's strange, it's as if the Toshiba drive appears twice, with its original name and then the way I renamed it "Mac Backup". Not sure if that's normal? When I click on Mac Backup it correctly states how much storage I have left, but it lists over 230,000 folders and over 1.3 million files, which seems way too much, even considering the regular backups.

Permissions problem when copying files from external hard drive

Hi.
I have recently reinstalled leopard (wiped the hard drive clean) on my macbook pro. (10.5.4). I had used Time Machine so I have a complete backup. But I only wanted a few of the files so I didn't do a backup restore. I went into the file directory of the backup on my external hard drive and dragged the folders I wanted back over to my laptop.
But I'm in permissions **** though! When I want to copy them over I get an alert saying you may not have privilege to do this and asks for my password. I enter my password and it copies fine. But every time I want to do anything with those files (like move them, or delete them) I have to re enter a password.
So, inside of the terminal I do a "ls -al" command to see whats going on and find that everything is the same as a natively created folder except for a '@' on the permissions column. I do a "ls -al@' to see more details and I get this:
drwxr-xr-x@ 6 xenition staff 204 Jul 20 17:08 Assets
com.apple.metadata:_kTimeMachineNewestSnapshot 50
com.apple.metadata:_kTimeMachineOldestSnapshot 50
I did run repair permissions from Disk Utility and it didn't solve it. How can I resolve the permissions on these files?
Message was edited by: risingtiger

run ls -aleO on the copied files and see if there are any ACLs or flags.
BTW, another (and possibly better) way to restore files from an old TM drive is via TM interface. control-click on TM in the dock and choose "browse other TM disks" select a disk to browse and go at it. when you try to restore something you'll be prompted for a location to restore it to and maybe a password.

Can't Transfer Files to External Hard Drive Anymore

I have a Toshiba External hard drive, 1 TB, (I've only used 140.51 GB) that I have been saving files and photos to. A window would pop up asking me what I wanted to use the hard drive for, and I always click decide later. The other day I accidentally clicked a different option and now it won't let me put pictures on it anymore and says read only. Is there a way I can change this back to where I can save my photos to the hard drive without erasing anything off of it?

In that case, I can guarantee the drive isn't formatted for Mac. The drive can't be recognized because NTFS which is a PC format. OS X can read a NTFS drive and copy data on it to your iMac but it cannot write to NTFS. If the drive is going to be only used with a Mac then it needs to be reformatted in Mac OS Extended) Journaled). This is easy to do and is explained in:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3509
If you are going to share the external HD with PCs and Macs you can still do this, here is a MacWorld article that explains how:
http://www.macworld.com/article/1165513/how_to_share_an_external_drive_between_a _mac_and_a_pc.html

HELP! I can't copy files to my hard drive

This is weird. I've had my MP since it came out and all was fine until the other day. All of a sudden I cannot copy anything to my Hard Drive! Not from a CD, not from an external HD. I can copy TO other places but not to my working folders. I also cannot copy from a DVD (where I have files archived) to an external drive I use or my HD.
Whatever happened though seems to have affected my other computer (G4 Quicksilver) which I have networked to my MP because I can't stuff copy there either. Nor can I copy items back and forth when connected.
I've repaired permissions many times.
Any ideas?

Verify the disk, then verify permnissions. And make sure that "Ignore Ownership on this volume" (Get Info) is not selected, or is not even present (shouldn't be for boot drive).
It sounds like an ownership issue, maybe a corrupt directory.

My Mac Can't See Files on External Hard Drive

Hi,
I'm having some trouble with my iMac today. It can't see any files on my NTFS External Hard Drive after a sharing change, I'm using Paragon NTFS for Mac OSX v8.0.0.
Yesterday evening I tried to share the drive over my network by clicking System Preferences / Sharing / File Sharing and then adding the drive as a shared folder. It is since doing this that I cannot see my files on this external HD. I have a second NTFS HD here which I connected and I can see the files on that drive so I don't think it's a software issue.
I have tried a few things to try and fix it but to no avail.
1. I have tried removing it from the shared folder list but that hasn't solved the problem. I tried adding it a second time just in case but that didn't do anything either.
2. I have repaired the disk permissions via disk utility
3. I have tried "defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles TRUE
killall Finder" to show hidden files but they still don't appear. I have reversed this so hidden files are no longer visible.
If I connect the drive to my Windows 7 laptop I can see and access all of the files.
I hope someone can help out with this issue. If you need any other information just let me know.
Kind regards,
Kim
System Details
iMac 24" Early 2008 Model
Core 2 Duo - 3.06Ghz
4GB RAM
OSX 10.7.2
iomega 1TB External Hard Drive
Formatted NTFS
Paragon NTFS for Mac OSX v8.0.0

I had the same problem but only after I upgraded to Lion. I could see the files on my external drive on other Macs using older software. It seems that Lion wasn't seeing old files on the external drive. So we accessed the files on a Mac using Snow Leopard, copied all the files into one new folder on the same external hard drive and now they're there on Lion. Problem solved! I hope this helps

Error -50 when trying to copy files to external hard drive.

When trying to copy files (itunes music folder) to an external hard drive, I get the following message: Copying music failed. An unknown error occurred (-50).
I have tried repairing disk permissions but still get the message. Any thoughts?

Gary,
A couple of posts referencing "error -50" seem to indicate that the error could result from a corrupted file.
One from Kappy follows:
Error -50 Post
One way you could save your music to the other drive would be to do it folder by folder (dragging each artist's folder, to the other drive). I suspect you won't have many (if any) errors doing that, and if you hit the corrupted file, you can come back to that folder and see which one is bad. You could also try to drag groups of artists folders to the drive if you had quite a few. One note: If you save your files this way, you won't be saving the library, which contains all the playlists you've created...you'll have to recreate them.
If you needed that music down the road, you could just do a File>Import from iTunes....
Hope this helps,
Bob

Can not copy files to another hard drive for backup

30May07
Apple Support:
I need to copy files from my home to an external hard drive because I need to do a complete re-install, and erase the laptop's hard drive.
When I try to either move the home folder the icon is a house, I get an question stating that some of my files do not have permssions, do I want to continue anyway (Yes, I do!)
A bit into the move, I get this message (dealing with permissions):
Can not copy 1528.emix . Error code -36 .
I have no such file or any .emix files either. I was able to copy to whole hard disk, not just the home to the same external drive two weeks ago.
How can I copy my HOME to my external drive so I can reinstall the OS?
Thank you for your help

07Jun07
I believe the problem was my computer's internal drive. It corrupted several files. I had a very hard time copying the files. The -36 error stopped any transfer cold.
I did a complete install of the OS.
I need a way to determine what files are corrupt so I can delete them. It took 24 hours to constantly keep trying to copy the files to the external drive. I ended up deleting a lot of un-corrupt files. How can I determine which ones are bad so I don't delete good data?
Thank you for your help. I am also grateful to the Apple Store in Tucson, AZ.
You are having a hardware problem - there's a problem
on one of the drives in this story.
This can be caused by extra hardware connected to the
computer, so if you have anything extra connected to
the computer (external iSight, iPod, USB hub,
anything) disconnect it.
If that doesn't help, try reformatting the external
drive and try again.
If that doesn't help, just rescue what you can,
because the next step is that you're going to be
reformatting the internal drive.

Can't delete files from external hard drive

So here's an interesting problem that I've never run across. I have a Western Digital hard drive plugged in and I was deleting some files off it today when suddenly it started saying that there were some files in use and it couldn't delete those. I hit "Continue" which usually does the trick but it just deleted everything else and left a bunch of folders with these weird empty files in them. So I quit all programs and tried again. Same thing, "Cannot delete, file in use." Tried rebooting both my computer and the external, again "Files in use." Did a google search, followed numerous suggestions, terminal sudo rm -r +file name, a force delete app, secure delete, holding down the option button while deleting... No dice. When I try the sudo rm thing in terminal it tells me that the folder doesn't exist AND that it isn't empty and won't delete it. (I love computers) When I do a right click->Get info on it, it says that I have read-write permissions but that the files are locked but won't let me unlock them (I'm the system administrator). When I look at the files in finder, it says they're actually aliases. What's really weird is that the file names are all messed up and have asian characters and stuff in them. I didn't create these aliases or have files with those characters in them. Soooo... Any suggestions? Cause I've read the threads and tried just about everything. I'm concerned this drive is headed for a crash or maybe just needs to be wiped and then put my stuff back on cause it's gotten errors over time. I don't know, I've never had this happen before and I'm pretty good with computers. If it was a windows computer I'd be doing a scan disk and defrag on it but I don't know how to do that on a mac to an external hard drive. I honestly don't know if this is a hardware or software problem. Any help would be appreciated.

Oh... well this is interesting... disk utility is say that it IS formatted MS-DOS (FAT32). Is that what's causing these errors? This thing has been running with my mac beautifully for years. So do I pull my stuff off, wipe it and reformat it for a mac? Or since it is FAT 32 can I hook it up to a windows computer and fix the problem? Since I had the wrong format, I can delete the files but if I don't fix the format this will keep happening?
Volume repair reported:
Verify and Repair volume “750GBEXT”
** /dev/disk1s1
** Phase 1 - Preparing FAT
** Phase 2 - Checking Directories
/.../SpryAssets/_NOTES has entries after end of directory
Truncate? yes
/..../My Work has entries after end of directory
Truncate? yes
** Phase 3 - Checking for Orphan Clusters
95906 files, 181003968 KiB free (5656374 clusters)
***** FILE SYSTEM WAS MODIFIED *****
Volume repair complete.Updating boot support partitions for the volume as required.
And thanks!

Error code 36 when copying files to external hard drive!

I keep getting this error when I try to copy files to my external hard drives. It is the same error no matter what drive I use. It says it cannot perform the operation because the data cannot be written - like there is a permissions problem, but I checked all the files, and there is no permission problems. The file sizes are small .iff and .jpg --- There is not more than 10 characters in the naming, so what is going on? I have folders inside of folders, and it will not copy - but if I go into the folders and copy each file one at a time, by itself, it works. I don't get it? Anybody have any thoughts?

a very common issue caused by a bug in snow leopard finder when dealing with FAT formatted drives. see this link for details and a fix
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=11122044&#11122044

Can't transfer files to External Hard Drive

I'm trying to transfer files to an external hard drive, Free Agent, which I was freely able to do from my pc.
Get Info on the hard drive gives me, Sharing & Permissions: You can only read.
I went into Sharing in System Pref. Added the hard drive and all it's folders to Shared Folders. Put a tick in File Sharing. And under Users it says that the System Admin. can Read & Write.
But I am still unable to transfer files to the H.D. Holding down CMD doesn't help nothing; they just go flying back to the orig. folder!
Where do I go next? Thanks.

Make sure the file format of the new hard drive is the same as supported by Mac OS
Is that HDD formatted with NTFS? Check it out via selecting the HDD icon and pressing CMD+I and look under format.
FAT32
Read/Write FAT32 from both native Windows and native Mac OS X.
No individual file larger than 4GB.
NTFS
Read/Write NTFS from native Windows.
Read only NTFS from native Mac OS X
To Read/Write NTFS from Leopard: Install MacFUSE and NTFS-3G. You can install both with NTFS-3G for Mac OS X.
To Read/Write NTFS from Snow Leopard: Guide: Enable native NTFS Read/Write in Snow Leopard
(Be aware that some are of the opinion that enabling native NTFS in SL is unstable/unreliable, and favor the MacFuse/NTFS-3G method for Snow Leopard)
HFS
Read/Write HFS from native Mac OS X
To Read/Write HFS from Windows, Install MacDrive
To Read HFS (but not Write) from Windows, Install HFSExplorer

Copied Files to External Hard drive and they are not available now.. where

Please help!
I have a G4 that had an original 20GB Hard drive. I installed a 60GB Hard drive. I was running OS 9 on the 20GB drive and OS X on the 60GB. I was working with a lot of video and pics and filled the 60GB drive, so I added an external 250GB drive.
Recently, I received messages that my start up disk was almost full (60GB), so I moved my users file from the 60GB drive to the 250GB. The file size was 47ish GB and so I thought I would create some room. The move took approx. 40 mins as I copied the folder over to the 250GB drive. Once it was there I verified it only by it's size and once I saw that it existed on the 250, I trashed the users file from the 60GB drive and then emptied trash.
I lost the icons and items on my desktop, however, desktop background remained the same. I cannot access anything that I opriginally had. The users file still has the same folders that it did, but they are now relatively empty. Each folder is approx. 50 kB in size but the users folder still exists as 47GB.
If what I have explained makes sense, can someone help me to either copy back my users folder (I tried that, but the 60GB drive still says it is full) or suggest something else (And not that I am a fool, as I figured that one out already!)
I ran Diskwarrior last night to verify the pathways etc. and everything is in order... I am lost... Please help if you can!
Thanks!
David

Dear David,
Did you move the entire "yourhomedirectory" name over to the 250 gig HD and then did you delete the entire "yourhomedirectory" file?
From what I have read, OS X will always be looking for Desktop, Documents, Library, Movies, Music, etc under "yourhomedirectory". There is some way to tell the system that they are located somewhere else but it is kind of hard.
When you mount the 250 gig drive do you see any of the files that you you moved over?
What do you see when you log into the OS X volume. Are there any files for you to see.
Not really sure what you did but let's see if we can get you fixed.
Dan

Can't copy files to external hard drive

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