External hard drive as main libary

I have a powerbook with a crappy 20GB HD so i want to use my 260GB Lacie HDD to store my music and run my itunes from. How do i set this up. I'm new to the mac world, i got this powerbook for free and want to use it just for my ipod & music.
help please

i got it

Similar Messages

  • Use time machine to backup external hard drive (not main one)

    Hi all,
    I've searched for information on this and getting nowhere. Not sure if it's possible, but I have two USB hard drives now as I've run out of space on my laptop. So therefore I really use one of the hard drives for my main storage and drag files across to the other one to back that up.
    It would be easier if I could just use time machine to back up the one external hard drive to the other. I don't want to just replicate what's on my laptop hard drive.
    Does anyone know if this is possible? Would appreciate any help.
    Cheers
    Paul

    Thanks for your reply V.K. much appreciated.
    I have gone into the options and I can see my external drives there, but for some reason I can't remove them from the exclusion list. I can add and remove the Laptop HD from this list, but for some reason the "-" button becomes disabled whenever I select the external Hard Drives.
    Is there a reason for this? I've been using both drives for a while, so they are both Mac formatted.
    Thanks again.

  • External hard drive as "main library"

    I have a question. Until now i have imported all of my pictures to the internal harddrive, and it is getting full. I have an external harddrive (lacie 1 TB) connected in a network via airport extreme.
    Is it possible to move my library (the master images) to an external harddrive, and still have access to the versions without being connected to the external harddrive?
    If it is, or you have a better suggestion for managing my pictures, please let me know.

    Is it possible to move my library (the master images) to an external harddrive, and still have access to the versions without being connected to the external harddrive?
    Yes, if you create a referenced library and build high quality preview images. This way you can browse your versions, rate them, share them to the Media Browser. The only thing that you cannot do with master image files offline (when the external volume is not mounted) would be to edit your images - anything that actually needs the master files.
    - Connect your external volume - make sure it is formatted MacOS X Extended
    - Select the images that you want to move to an external volume in the Browser.
    - From the main menu bar select: File > Relocate Masters, and select a folder on the external volume to move them to
    - In the Aperture Preferences open the Previews Tab and enable the sharing of previews. Select a reasonable size for the previews. preferrably the pixelsize of your screen.
    Regards
    Léonie

  • External hard drives and photos

    i have read some of the other support answers to this, but don't fully understand.
    i have hooked up my external hard drive in order to back up my iphoto libraries. (side note-if i do this, will the libraries move as one entity into a newly created folder, or will i have to create a folder in the hard drive... i cannot do this by control click, but maybe once is is reformatted?; and will they keep the same order). i have learned by reading different forums that i will need to reformat my hard drive to Mac OS extended (journaled)... and i read somewhere else about some sort of partitioning with mac os extended with no journaling for media storage. i will be using my external hard drive for, mainly, storing pictures and video. can i get someone's opinion on if i should partition or not?
    also, in order to reformat, i understand i need to erase in the format the external hard drive has already, but once that is complete, will it give me the option to reformat? and once my hard drive is reformatted to mac, will i be able to hook it up to a pc in order to share my pictures with someone else?
    new to mac, sorry that i may come off a bit computer illiterate, it is because i am. if you have enough patience to answer my question, pleeease tell me what to do in a speaking-to-a-three-year-old way.
    sorry for the twenty questions, my head is full of 'em.
    xoxo....

    -if i do this, will the libraries move as one entity into a newly created folder,
    Drag one Library icon from the Pictures Folder to the external and that gets everything.
    i have learned by reading different forums that i will need to reformat my hard drive to Mac OS extended (journaled)... and i read somewhere else about some sort of partitioning with mac os extended with no journaling for media storage. i will be using my external hard drive for, mainly, storing pictures and video. can i get someone's opinion on if i should partition or not?
    I see no advantage to partitioning the drive.
    i understand i need to erase in the format the external hard drive has already, but once that is complete, will it give me the option to reformat?
    This is all in the Help to Disk Utility. In essence you don't wipe the drive to "no format" you reformat the drive the the new one. It's an all in one process.
    nd once my hard drive is reformatted to mac, will i be able to hook it up to a pc in order to share my pictures with someone else?
    No. Not unless they install additional software on their PC.
    Regards
    TD

  • What is the best external hard drive for mac airbook

    I require a external hard drive, i mainly require it to download my itunes and photos.
    Any advice??

    In general I recommend staying away from Western Digital external drives because they use proprietary chipsets that don't always play nice with the Mac - plus their customer support doesn't (support the customer). I strongly recommend anything that OWC sells. Prices aren't the lowest but they are competitive, the company stands behind its products, and customer support is stellar.

  • I thought I set up my computer to store my I tunes library to my external hard drive.  However, I recently found out that my library is stored on my main C drive.  Does any one know how to tranfer the libray from the C drive to an exteranl dirve.

    I thouhgt I set up ITunes to store my library on the external drive.  However, I recently sound out that the library is stored on my main C drive.  Is there someway to move the library to the exernal drive and still have everything function correctly?

    If you go into Edit > Preferences > Advanced then you can change the location of the iTunes media folder.  Keep in mind that if you do this and you unplug your external hard drive, iTunes won't be able to locate your music and you may get the little red "!" marks.

  • Help needed. I have a 3TB external hard drive partitioned into 1TB's. I used one partition as backup for the main computer hard drive. But now it is greyed out as shown in the disk utility and its name changed, i dont know how that happened, i tried verif

    Help needed. I have a 3TB external hard drive partitioned into 1TB's. I used one partition as backup for the main computer hard drive. But now it is greyed out as shown in the disk utility and its name changed, i dont know how that happened, i tried verifying and repairing it but had no luck. I also tried mounting and unmounting it but still no solution. Anyone to help please?

    Looks bad. I would strongly advise backing up the stuff on the other two partitions as soon as possible in case the rest of the drive goes wrong.
    Beyond that, Disk Utility has limited abilities to repair disks, DiskWarrior uses a different approach and might, emphasis might be more successful. It has certainly done the job for me in the past when Disk Utility could not.
    See http://www.alsoft.com/diskwarrior/

  • Using an external hard drive as a main HD.

    i haave a 40gb hard drive in my emac, and i was wondering if i could use an external hard drive (120-160gb) as my main drive for music, photos,videos, etc. but still use the internal 40gb for booting up and for applications. And if so, could i use time machine to back up both internal and external drive to one big external drive.
    thanks.

    tuggers,
    Well like Tom says you can use the external drive for storage and still use the internal for booting. Actually like Tom says you could boot from that external if it's FireWire or USB 2.0. The advantage there would be that often things tend to get put on the boot drive if you're doing a lot of video photo. I have the same setup that you're contemplating and my boot drive tends to get filled up so I'm constantly having to housekeep on that drive.
    could i use time machine to back up both internal and external drive to one big external drive
    Dunno if Time Machine will back up both drives but CCC and SuperDuper certainly will.
    http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/13260#feedback
    Richard

  • Having trouble transferring itunes library to an external hard drive.  All of my music is in the main ITUNES library and every site and answer I get says tranfer my library/user name/ da da da da da.... I am not familiar with this-need a simple way-thx

    HELP!   I have looked at video sites, looked on here, to no avail.   Please dont talk negatively about my question (as I have seen some pretty mean responses to topics )   I am trying to copy my itunes music to an external hard drive.  Here is my situation:  All of my music is in the main ITUNES location.  I  have been told to save the "user library".  I really need an elementary step by step way.  I plan to visit the library in town tomorrow to get a book but worried because my computer is having issues  TONIGHT.  Thanks for any help....  This is so helpful to know there may be help out there.

    iTunes: How to move [or copy] your music to a new computer [or another drive] - http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4527
    Quick answer if you let iTunes manage your music:  Copy the entire iTunes folder (and in doing so all its subfolders and files) intact to the other drive.  Start iTunes with the option (shift on Windows) key held down and guide it to the new location of the library.
    To see your iTunes folder click on the Music folder icon in your Finder sidebar.

  • Trying to move my iTunes Music and other media from the main drive on my pc to an external hard drive but iTunes is not recognizing the new file location?  Ideas?

    Trying to move my iTunes Music and other media from the main drive on my pc to an external hard drive but iTunes is not recognizing the new file location?  Ideas?

    Hello there, Underwriter.
    The following Knowledge Base article provides in-depth instructions on how to migrate your content to an external drive:
    iTunes: How to move your music to a new computer
    http://support.apple.com/kb/ht4527
    Particularly of note for your situation:
    External drive
    This option requires more work than Home Sharing, but it creates a backup of your iTunes library on the external drive in addition to moving your content.
    Notes before you start:
    You can use most iPods as an external drive.
    Windows operating systems don't recognize Mac OS-formatted disks (HFS or HFS Plus formats). Because of this, you can't use a Mac-formatted iPod or external drive to move your music to a Windows PC. See iPod: How to determine iPod's hard disk format if you're not sure how your iPod is formatted.
    Mac OS X can read Windows-formatted iPods and drives. This means there are many ways to migrate your information from your old Windows-based PC to your new Mac.
    Mac OS X: To be sure external drives appear on your desktop, choose Preferences from the Finder menu. Be sure the options for "External disks" and "Hard disks" are enabled.
    Part 1: Locating and consolidating the iTunes Media folder
    Part 2: Copy iTunes folder from the old computer:
    Part 3: Get iTunes ready on your new computer
    Part 4: Back up any music that's already on your new computer
    Part 5: Copy music to your new computer
    Part 6: Add preexisting music that was on the new computer back into the library
    Thanks for reaching out to Apple Support Communities.
    Cheers,
    Pedro.

  • Can I simply move my main pictures folder to External Hard Drive?

    My pictures folder contains all my catalogues and all my photos that are stored in Lightroom 3. I am running out of internal storage space, so I need to get an external hard drive.
    Is it possible for me to simply move my Main Pictures folder, which contains all the photos and catalogues to the external hard drive, and still be able to use those photos in Lightroom just like before?

    What he means is inside LR, you'll have to rebind the location of the images.
    After you move your image folders (and one assumes, the images) to your external drive, the next time you start up LR you will have a bunch of '?'s marking the images and folders.  Do not panic!
      LR runs a database about your images, including the locations.  If you move your images in the OS, it won't tell LR that you've moved them.  So when you start up LR again, you have to tell it.
    In the left menu in LR, you should see your drives and folders.  Right-click on the top most/left most folder, and select "find missing folder" and browse to your new location.  If you kept the same folder structure (i.e., you just dragged your top folder onto your new hard drive) then LR will reconnect all the folders "below" it in one swoop.
    If you reorganized as well, then you'll have to reconnect them the hard way.  Next time, do folder reorganizations within LR, and that won't happen.
    I move folders in the OS instead of LR, it's faster.  But I keep the same format, so I only have to reconnect the top level folder!
    Cheers!

  • Need to move (consolidate) my iTunes files (media/library) from my external hard drive (i use time capsule as an ext hd)  back to my main iMac where my iTunes is located.

    I used my time capsule (1st gen) as an external hard drive to store my iTunes files and my iTunes app is on my main iMac.  Now, I've decided to move those iTunes files from my external hard drive (TC) back to my iMac where my iTunes app is located.  What is the best way to do this?

    Is the Time Capsule the right piece of kit for the job?
    Not really, no.
    TC is a dumb as board hard disk in an airport extreme router. It has no media servers.. no backup.. it is slow and designed for TM target for laptops. The major one here is lack of backup. Any files you put on the TC can and will be lost at some point.. and to backup you need to have a computer connected to it with an external hard disk.. and a 3rd party backup because TM is too dumb to back up network drives.
    TC is designed to spin up slow and spin down quickly at the end of backup. You will have issues when you stream media from it.
    ATV needs to connect to itunes server.. not the library. You will still need a computer running. Same for lots of things.. since apple designed their system to be dependent on itunes.
    The best idea is a media computer.. a mac mini is ideal. Don't need the latest greatest.. but an actual mac running itunes. Unfortunately it doesn't have large internal drives.. so it is still a bit kludgy in needing a fast external drive.. but at least you have automatic backups.

  • Cant import my itunes libary from my external hard drive

    i moved my all my music from my laptop to my external hard drive and im not able to open itunes and listed to my music. I can physically find each song but i dont have the time to find locate each one of my tracks. Please help!

    The first and best option to do would be open iTunes and go into preferences. Once there head to the advanced tab. Select the iTunes Music folder on your external drive. That may fix the links you haven't already but will break the links that you created by hand.
    If you are running time machine go back to before you moved the music onto the external drive.
    If you can do this move the iTunes music folder onto the external drive being sure to include the xml file. The next time you open iTunes it should ask you to locate or create a new library (if this does not happen simply hold the option key while starting iTunes). Select the folder containing the music and xml files on your external drive. This will open it up from there and be no different than it was before with the exception of being external.
    Note that this will also work if you want to take your music with you but not the computer. Hold the option key and select the folder on another computer and there is your iTunes ready to sync an iPod and not damage the host computer. Also you can create multiple libraries for one user but beware of duplicates.

  • Home network and Externeal hard drives

    I've recently set up a home network to allow me to share my files across my two iMac's. My older iMac I've setup with my external hard drives almost as a media center to allow my new Sonos speakers to use my itunes libary, all but one of these are formatted as MS-DOS FAT-32 to allow my read / write from Windows as well as my Mac (My main iMac runs Windows 8.1 on bootcamp and I flip between the two).
    My question is this is there anyway for me to get Mac to Mac sharing to read /write to and from the MS-DOS FAT-32 formatted drives they all display fine when i view them Mac to Widows or is this a bug where a mac can read / write when connected directly or via the screen sharing  just not the file sharing. Any help would be great or if anyone has a workaround please let me know.
    Cheers
    Nick

    It sounds like you are logged in as Guest (which only has access to each users home directory and drop box). If your navigating to the server via Shared in the sidebar, it should say the name of the user you are logged into that server as. It defaults to Guest. If it is Guest, click the Connect As button and log in as the desired user. You should then be able to see the share points (hard drives etc) you expected.
    {quote:title=frankmlinar wrote:}My definition of persistent for use below is: When logged on as a registered user, the computer remains logged on and does not revert to Guest when clicking on various computers or drives in the finder and then returning to the logged on computer in the finder.{quote}
    So this is the behavior you want. Correct? You want to only log in once and not have it revert back to being logged in as Guest if you navigate somewhere else and then back again? Correct
    So, what you are seeing is this:
    Step 1) Click on the server in the sidebar. It automatically, by default, logs you in as Guest.
    Step 2) Click on the Connect As button and an Authentication dialog will appear. Login as another user (say Bob).
    Note: You should be able to see the share points with no problem.
    Step 3) Click on the "Desktop" entry in the sidebar
    Step 4) Click on the same server as in Step 1 in the sidebar
    Expected results: It will log you in as Bob.
    Actual results: It will log you in as Guest.
    This is behaving correctly (and is how AFP works). If you want it to remain logged in as Bob after Step 4, either create a keychain via the authentication dialog in Step 2 or before Step 3 you double clicked one of the hard drives listed for that server (or single clicked if your in Column View) to mount it.
    Just logging in to an AFP server creates a temporary/soft connection with the server, you have to mount something to make it a solid connection.

  • I need to do a clean install of maverick on my 2010 mbp what disk do i use and how do i move certain files from an external hard drive

    I want to do a clean install of maverick on my 2010 mbp.  I need to know what disk to use and also how i take certain files off my external hard drive and put on my computer.  When I was having problems with my airport they did a clean install and they pulled files of my time machine.   however they forgot to put the partition back in for a windows side.  Originally I had Parellels on my computer.  After my external hard drive got corrupted i called apple and they fixed the problem but didn't have me set up the time machine except for the external hard drive.  Now my only back up is from the external not from the laptop.    I am not sure how to do any of this.  I am not computer savvy...PLEASE I NEED  HELP>

    First, you need to make a backup of your MBP onto your external drive. I suggest you start by cloning your MBP drive to the external drive:
    Clone Mavericks, Lion/Mountain Lion using Restore Option of Disk Utility
    Boot to the Recovery HD:
    Restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the COMMAND and R keys until the menu screen appears. Alternatively, restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the OPTION key until the boot manager screen appears. Select the Recovery HD and click on the downward pointing arrow button.
         1. Select Disk Utility from the main menu then press the Continue
             button.
         2. Select the destination volume from the left side list.
         3. Click on the Restore tab in the DU main window.
         4. Select the destination volume from the left side list and drag it
             to the Destination entry field.
         5. Select the source volume from the left side list and drag it to
             the Source entry field.
         6. Double-check you got it right, then click on the Restore button.
    Destination means the external backup drive. Source means the internal startup drive.
    This clone is fully bootable and also contains a clone of your Recovery HD.
    Second, you need to do a clean install of OS X onto your MBP as follows:
    Install or Reinstall Mavericks or Mountain Lion from Scratch
    Be sure you backup your files to an external drive or second internal drive because the following procedure will remove everything from the hard drive.
    OS X Mavericks- Erase and reinstall OS X
    OS X Mountain Lion- Erase and reinstall OS X
    OS X Lion- Erase and reinstall Mac OS X
    Note: You will need an active Internet connection. I suggest using Ethernet if possible
                because it is three times faster than wireless.
    This should accomplish your goals. You will have a clean install of OS X on your MBP and a bootable clone of your old system and all your files on the external drive.

Maybe you are looking for