External USB Drive (MAC OS Extended) Problem

I had an NTFS formatted external USB2 drive which I have been trying to format as a MAC OS Extended (journaled) drive to use with my iMac. After partitoning it with disk utility using the MAC OS Extended partition scheme the drive will not mount and attempting to run first aid on it results in an unspecific error message.
I even went as far as zeroing the drive to see if it would mount. No go. If I format it (using disk utitlity) as a FAT32 drive the drive mounts without a problem. The drive also mounts without a problem on a PC.
I'd appreciate if someone could explain why formatting the drive with as a MAC OS Extended partition makes the drive unmountable and if there is a fix for it.
Thanks

I don't want to use this as a drive on both a PC and a Mac, just the Mac. If if leave it as a FAT32 the Mac can use it however the file sizes are limited to 4GB which is not good. I have some files from iMovie and QT that need to be stored and which I don't want to have to break up in order to put them on the drive.
I'm still surprised that the the process of converting a PC drive to a Mac drive is not easier. Especially since more people are starting to move to Macs.

Similar Messages

Time Capsule external USB drive won't reconnect remotely over Back To My Mac

I'm running a Mac Mini at work, connected via ethernet to an enterprise network (I have no idea what routers they are using, or how they are set up).
At home, I have a MBP laptop and a Time Capsule (hardwired to cable modem) with an external USB drive attached.
All 3 machines (Mac Mini, MBP, TC via Airport Utility) have Back To My Mac switched on.
I can access the external USB drive on my home TC from my work Mac Mini....until the Mini falls asleep. When I wake it back up, the connection back to the TC fails. However....after restarting the Mini, the connection works again.
My first thought was that the corporate network / firewall / etc was causing the problem - not leaving correct ports open, or someting to that effect. However, I realised that if that were the case, restarting the Mini shouldn't help, but it does.
Does anyone have any idea how sleeping breaks being able to access a TC's external drive remotely over BTMM?
The Mac Mini is a 2.3GHz Core i5 with 8GB RAM and plenty of HD space.
The MBP is a 15" late 2013 retina, 2.6 GHz Core i7, 16 GB RAM, also plenty of HD space.
The TC is a 2 TB 4th generation model.
Thanks!
J

Sorry that did not work. This works well for me using Lacie drives, but I haven't tried Iomega.
Have you checked Iomega's site to see if any software/firmware updates available?
Also noticed during a quick search that a number of users are reporting mounting problems with Iomega. Not sure if this applies to you or not.
http://discussions.apple.com/search.jspa?search=Go&q=iomegadrive+won%27tmount

Problems with a shared external USB drive

I have setup an external USB drive on my iMac 10.6 and use it for Time Machine backup. When I try to access this drive over my wireless network from my PowerBook 10.5.8 for TM backup, I can only see the drive under Shared as a Folder, not a drive icon. It is not available for the PB's TM app. This is a HP 1 TB drive formatted in 1 partition MacOS Extended journaled GUID .... and it works as a backup drive for the desktop 10.6 TM.
The very same thing happens if I connect this USB drive to my Airport Extreme only both the PB and the iMac see the drive as a folder and neither can use the drive for a TM backup.
So, how can I see the drive as a drive icon from the PB and have it available for TM backup over the network?

Douglas McKibbin wrote:
The very same thing happens if I connect this USB drive to my Airport Extreme
Do not attempt to back up that way -- it's "iffy" and +*not supported by Apple.+*
It sounds like you've missed a step in the setup. See #22 in [Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions|http://web.me.com/pondini/Time_Machine/FAQ.html] (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of this forum).
Be sure to note the advice there to partition the drive, so each Mac has it's own, exclusive space.

Moving iPhoto to external drive; have formatted external disk to Mac OS Extended (Journaled), moved the iPhoto library to external drive; when trying to change the library, the iPhoto file on new external is greyed out can't be selected.What went wrong?

Must have done something wrong..
1. formatted external disk to Mac OS Extended (Journaled) - required a partition, but that went fine. Entire new external disk was included in the partition formatted to Mac OS Extneded (journaled).
2. moved iPhoto library to new external disk
3. Holding Option key down, opened iPhoto
4. Choose library feature appeared, however when new library function option appeared and "choose library" selected, the iPhoto folder appearing in the new external drive was greyed out and not able to be selected. Therefore the default library remains the original iphoto library on the Mac.
I've moved the original iphoto library to the trash and then tried to start iPhoto. A message comes up that the iPhoto is in the trash and needs to be pulled out before iPhoto can start (clearly the new iphoto library on the external drive is not being seen.
Can anyone suggest where I went awry? Thanks!

Try trash the com.apple.iPhoto.plist file from the HD/Users/ Your Name / library / preferences folder.
(On 10.7 or later: Hold the option (or alt) key while clicking on the Go menu in Finder to access the User Library)
(Remember you'll need to reset your User options afterwards. These include minor settings like the window colour and so on. Note: If you've moved your library you'll need to point iPhoto at it again.)
What's the plist file?
For new users: Every application on your Mac has an accompanying plist file. It records certain User choices. For instance, in your favourite Word Processor it remembers your choice of Default Font, on your Web Browser is remembers things like your choice of Home Page. It even recalls what windows you had open last if your app allows you to pick up from where you left off last. The iPhoto plist file remembers things like the location of the Library, your choice of background colour, whether you are running a Referenced or Managed Library, what preferences you have for autosplitting events and so on. Trashing the plist file forces the app to generate a new one on the next launch, and this restores things to the Factory Defaults. Hence, if you've changed any of these things you'll need to reset them. If you haven't, then no bother. Trashing the plist file is Mac troubleshooting 101.
Then try select it again.

PowerBook G4 external USB drive problem

I've got a 12" Powerbook G4.
All of the following operations were performed with the laptop plugged into the power adapter.
Today I connected a Bytecc external USB drive model 7050 containing a Maxtor 6 L060J3 60 GB and started backing up my main drive and moving some movie projects to it.
I initialized the drive using the Disk Utility.
I used Finder to copy almost 55 GB of data to the initialized drive.
I attemped to use the 'eject' icon in finder to disconnect the drive so that I could remove power and move some things around my desk. The drive did not 'eject'.
I disconnected the USB cable from the G4 and got the warning message from OSX.
I powered down the drive and moved things around then attempted to reconnect the USB drive.
I repeatedly got a "Volume not found" error with the correct name of the drive. The drive still appeard in the finder pane.
I attempted to verify and repair the disk using the Disk Utility, which still recognized the disk, but was still getting the "Volume not found" error when I attemtped to access the drive using Finder.
I used the disk utility to verify and repair the G4 system disk, at which time the USB drive dissapeared from the Finder window.
Now, attempts to reconnect the drive, do not show the drive as present in the Finder window, yet:
- when I disconnect the drive, I get a warning about stopping a device
- the drive still appears in the list of drives in the disk utlity app.
Any ideas on how I can get this drive to work again? I spent a lot of time dumping video into iMovie from my digital camcorder and I'd like to avoid reformatting the drive.
P.S. What is the correct way to shutdown and remove an external drive?
Thanks,
Larry Ice
12" Powerbook G4 Mac OS X (10.4.6)

The proper way to shut down and remove the drive is to unmount it (drag it to the trash) and then power down the drive before you unplug the usb cable. If the eject icon didn't work you should have tried dragging to the trash. If that didn't work go to Disk Utility and unmount from there. if that didn't work try Repairing the drive from Disk Utility. I would not have pulled the usb cable as you did.

[SOLVED] Problem with external USB drive started yesterday

My system freezes for about 65 seconds at the login screen. After 65 seconds, I can login and everything is normal afterwards.
I discovered that I can eliminate the freeze by disconnecting the external USB drive from the PC. Here are the error messages from kernel.log when the drive is connected:
Oct 15 23:10:14 localhost kernel: [ 17.035091] usb 1-1.3: device descriptor read/64, error -110
Oct 15 23:10:29 localhost kernel: [ 32.155955] usb 1-1.3: device descriptor read/64, error -110
Oct 15 23:10:29 localhost kernel: [ 32.325394] usb 1-1.3: new high speed USB device number 4 using ehci_hcd
Oct 15 23:10:31 localhost kernel: [ 34.045126] MediaState is connected
There is supposed to be a kernel boot option (irqpoll) to prevent this from occurring. However, that option seems to no longer work for kernels after 2.6.39. If I try using it with Arch, the system will not boot, saying all the CPU's failed.
I also don't understand why this just started happening yesterday, as the USB drive has been connected to the PC longer than I've been using Arch. Also, my kernel has not been updated since I installed Arch on Oct 8.
Does anyone know another fix or workaround for this problem?
Thanks,
Tim
Last edited by ratcheer (2011-10-17 01:30:08)

Problem solved
I feel stupid, but I also feel better. I turned off the PC, disconnected the power from the USB drive for about 15 seconds, reconnected the power, rebooted, removed the irqpoll kernel option, and Ubuntu started, perfectly. I need to learn that the USB drive just goes freaky sometimes and remember to do this. But, this is only the second time I've had to do this in months of use.
Tim

Single-user mode: How to mount and access an external USB drive?

My MacBook Pro HD is acting up. Cannot boot normally or into "safe mode". Cannot reinstall OS without wiping out the HD. Need to recover some critical files but DiskUtil First Aid and Restore options cannot successfully complete. Problem traced down to "invalid node structure" which means I either have a hardware problem or my filesystem partition directory structure is corrupted. I need to recover some files that are not backed up (timin issue with my regular backup process).
I can boot into single-user mode, mount the root file system (/sbin/mount -uw /) and can see/navigate the rot filesystem structure via good UNIX command line. Here's what I would like to do (in single-user mode):
1. Mount an external USB drive (250 GB already formatted as Mac OS X Extended)
2. Copy various files and/or directories from my HD to the external USB drive (UNIX cp command)
I realize I could go spend $$ for the Disk Warrior or Data Rescue products (or something similar) that SHOULD help me recover my HD or files, but it seems silly to do this when I can see, touch and taste them from within single-user mode....
Comments? Suggestions?
TIA --
Trent
P.S. Once I've recovered my files, I'll try to reformat the HD and then reinstall the OS. And THEN go have Apple look at my machine (thank goodness for AppleCare coverage)!

Resolution:
1) Boot system in single-user mode (SUM) with external HD attached.
2) Execute the following UNIX CLI commands once SUM boot process is completed:
# fsck -fy
# mount -uw /
# mkdir /Volumes/target_directory
# mount -t hfs -w /dev/diskXXX /Volumes/target_directory
# cp -RXv /source_directory /Volumes/target_directory
Where XXX is the device-level name for your external HD's data partition. In my case this was /dev/disk1s2. It may take some experimentation to identify this device name if your system has multiple HD's.
3) Verify contents were successfully copied onto the /Volumes/target_directory.
Comments and observations:
- Do NOT use "/" as your source directory - cp will make a second (redundant) copy of /volumes/target_directory
- I was able to successfully copy ALL files off my HD despite the fsck command's "invalid node structure" error message with this simple procedure. YMMV, depending on the state of your HD.
- The repeated disk0s2: I/O error warnings displayed during the SUM boot process did not seem to have a negative effect on this procedure. I also received this same error warning intermittently as I navigated the mounted filesystem did not seem to be a problem, either. Again, YMMV.
Commercial software:
I downloaded ProSoft Engineering's Data Rescue 3 product (trial version) before spending $99 to attempt to recover my "bad" HD's data via mounting to a good system with FW target mode. It could not successfully complete its "QuickScan" process and immediately hung on block 0 of 390M during its "Deep Scan" process. The product did seem to function properly on an operational system. ProSoft's technical support was responsive and helpful but had no answer for my "Deep Scan" error.
I did not attempt to use Alsoft's Disk Warrior 4 product. I could not find any trial software available and was reluctant to spend $100 based upon the mixed reviews and comments on this discussion forum as well as other reviews. Alsoft does claim to address the "invalid node structure" error in their marketing materials. Hindsight being 20/20 - I saved $100 by using this simple procedure.
Final note:
Neither Leopard nor Snow Leopard's installation DVD could recognize the bad internal HD when trying to do a reinstall. While DiskUtil was able to "see" the bad internal drive it immediately failed when I tried to do an "erase and format". Took the system to my local Apple store and the Genius ran a tool called "SMART Utility" from Volitans Software (www.volitans-software.com). SMART utility confirmed that my HD was bad so it was replaced. AppleCare pays for itself (once again!).

External USB drive won't mount after 10.9.5 upgrade

Is anyone else reporting the following issue? Immediately after installing OS X update 10.9.5 (13F34) on 09/18, my external USB drive (IOMega 1GB OS X Extended FS) used for Time Machine would no longer mount and isn't recognized. When I look at the drives in finder, it is missing. However, it does show up under the USB Hi-Speed Bus device tree:
USB Mass Storage:
Product ID:    0x0376
Vendor ID:    0x059b (Iomega Corporation)
Version:     0.00
Serial Number:    ABCDEF012314E2ED
Speed:    Up to 480 Mb/sec
Manufacturer:    Iomega
Location ID:    0x1a120000 / 3
Current Available (mA):    500
Current Required (mA):    0
Console message when device plugged in:
10/6/14 3:22:31.000 AM kernel[0]: USBMSC Identifier (non-unique): ABCDEF012314E2ED 0x59b 0x376 0x0, 2
mount command results:
devfs on /dev (devfs, local, nobrowse)
map -hosts on /net (autofs, nosuid, automounted, nobrowse)
map auto_home on /home (autofs, automounted, nobrowse)
/dev/disk1s2 on /Volumes/Mac-Mini 2 (hfs, local, nodev, nosuid, noowners)
System is Mac-Mini (late 2012), 2.5 Ghz i5, 8GB ram, 500GB local storage, 1TB on second Firewire disk for media, 1TB USB disk for Firewire (PROBLEM)
I have reinstalled the combined 10.9.5 OS upgrade, and verified that the drive works when connected to my other MB Pro (mid-2012 running Yosemite beta 3). There is no third party software that I'm aware of in use for this drive, as it's only for Time Machine backups.
Thanks

Is the drive's icon on the desktop (perhaps behind another icon, which is possible if Finder > View > Cleanup is enabled)?
If not, is the box Finder > Preferences > General > External Disks checked?
Is the drive listed in every Finder window's sidebar?
If not, is the box Finder > Preferences > Sidebar > External Disks checked?
Are Time Machine backups to the drive happening on schedule?
If not, does the drive appear in System Preferences > Time Machine > Select Disk?
Can you open /Volumes/Mac-Mini 2/Backups.backupdb using Finder > Go > Go to Folder...?
Does the drive appear in Disk Utility? Is it (or can it be) mounted there?
Have you tried to plug it in to a USB port on the Mini (not a hub) or into a different USB port on the Mini?
Have you tried this: shut down; unplug the drive; boot the Mac; after you have logged in and the Finder is done populating the desktop and menu bar, plug the drive in?

External USB drives will not mount under Mountain Lion

Since upgrading to Mountain Lion, two external USB2 drives that I have will not mount and cannot be viewed in the Finder. The same occurs on a 2012 MacBook Air, a 2009 iMac 27 and a 2010 MacMini, all running OS X Mountain Lion version 10.8.2.
Both drives are Samsung Story external USB drives (one is 1.5 GB and the other is 2 GB) and both have been formatted using Mac Disk Utility with a single Mac OS Extended (Journaled) partition, one using Snow Leopard and the other with Lion.
Both still mount correctly on a friends MacBook Pro that is still running Snow Leopard, and I had no problem with the same drives under Lion. Interestingly both can also be connected to Time Capsule USB port and show up correctly.
Both drives mount correctly under Windows 7 on BootCamp partitions that I have on both the 2012 MacBook Air, a 2009 iMac 27. These BootCamp partitions have Paragon HFS+ installed so I can read Mac formated drives.
Both drives show up in Disk Utility, but when attempt to mount the drives I get the message "The disk could not be mounted. Try running First Aid on the disk and retry mounting." I can run Repair in First Aid on the disk and get the message that the volume appears OK, but again have the same problem when I attempt to mount the disk.
I have also tried using Disk Utility 3,2, but still cannot mount the drives, though the program indicates there is no problem with the drives.
I have other portable USB including a Samsung portable USB2 drive, and two external USB3 drives, and I don't have problems with them.
There is clearly a problem with Mountain Lion with accessing (mounting) these Samsung Story USB drives, and the problem appears to be with Mountain Lion itself as the problem did not occur on the same Macs with Lion and does not occur with Bootcamp partitions on the machines.
I have a lot of time searching forums, but I have not found anyone with an identical problem.
I sure hope someone can help or that Apple come up with a fix for this issue which has only developed since the update to Mountain Lion.

bj10au wrote:
Since upgrading to Mountain Lion, two external USB2 drives that I have will not mount and cannot be viewed in the Finder. The same occurs on a 2012 MacBook Air, a 2009 iMac 27 and a 2010 MacMini, all running OS X Mountain Lion version 10.8.2.
Both drives are Samsung Story external USB drives (one is 1.5 GB and the other is 2 GB) and both have been formatted using Mac Disk Utility with a single Mac OS Extended (Journaled) partition, one using Snow Leopard and the other with Lion.
Both still mount correctly on a friends MacBook Pro that is still running Snow Leopard, and I had no problem with the same drives under Lion. Interestingly both can also be connected to Time Capsule USB port and show up correctly.
Both drives mount correctly under Windows 7 on BootCamp partitions that I have on both the 2012 MacBook Air, a 2009 iMac 27. These BootCamp partitions have Paragon HFS+ installed so I can read Mac formated drives.
Both drives show up in Disk Utility, but when attempt to mount the drives I get the message "The disk could not be mounted. Try running First Aid on the disk and retry mounting." I can run Repair in First Aid on the disk and get the message that the volume appears OK, but again have the same problem when I attempt to mount the disk.
I have also tried using Disk Utility 3,2, but still cannot mount the drives, though the program indicates there is no problem with the drives.
I have other portable USB including a Samsung portable USB2 drive, and two external USB3 drives, and I don't have problems with them.
There is clearly a problem with Mountain Lion with accessing (mounting) these Samsung Story USB drives, and the problem appears to be with Mountain Lion itself as the problem did not occur on the same Macs with Lion and does not occur with Bootcamp partitions on the machines.
I have a lot of time searching forums, but I have not found anyone with an identical problem.
I sure hope someone can help or that Apple come up with a fix for this issue which has only developed since the update to Mountain Lion.
You can start here
http://support.seagate.com/kbimg/flash/213059/213059_EN.HTML
Pete

Disk Utility Not Formatting External USB Drive

Hello,
I recently upgraded to Leopard.  Around this same time, my company purchased two, 1 Terabyte USB External drives for my coworker and I in the graphics/web development department.  They arrived this morning and we were very excited.
My problem is that I cannot get Disk Utility to erase/format the new, external USB TB drive for use with my MBP.  Disk Utility fails almost immediately with the following message:
"*Disk Erase Failed*
Disk Erase failed with the error:
File system formatter failed."
The options I'm choosing for the Erase are:
Volume Format: MAC OS EXTENDED  (i've even tried the 'journaled' version too)
Name: TB
As soon as I hit 'Erase' I get the error message I listed above.  The volume never mounts on my desktop and does not exist.  I can see the drive itself in the System Profiler, so my Mac sees it, it just can't format it!  I've also made sure all my permissions were repaired, so I'm just a little confused as to why this simple task keeps failing?
Is there some additional, esoteric step that I'm missing?
My coworker was able to get his disk to work because he did NOT have Time Machine turned on yet.  When he connected his new TB drive, Time Machine asked him to format/initialize the disk and he of course said "ok."  I had Time Machine set to use my OLD external USB drive and it's been working great. As of this writing, my coworker is a happy camper. I, however, am not.  I'm not blaming Time Machine, just noting the differences between my coworker's experience and my own. Since the volume is not currently mounted on my machine, I can't format my disk the same way as my coworker has done using Time Machine, since Time Machine doesn't see the volume.
My fear is that the manufacturer (whom I've also contacted and am awaiting their response) will throw this back to a software problem....and the folks on the forum here will point their fingers and say 'hardware problem.'  Ah, the eternal struggle.....who to blame?
Any help or additional troubleshooting tips are greatly appreciated.

This is the best, and only, way to format an external hard drive, which is courtesy of Kappy.
Extended Hard Drive Preparation
1. Open Disk Utility in your Utilities folder. If you need to reformat your startup volume, then you must boot from your OS X Installer Disc. After the installer loads select your language and click on the Continue button. When the menu bar appears select Disk Utility from the Installer menu (Utilities menu for Tiger or Leopard.)
2. After DU loads select your hard drive (this is the entry with the mfgr.'s ID and size) from the left side list. Note the SMART status of the drive in DU's status area. If it does not say "Verified" then the drive is failing or has failed and will need replacing. SMART info will not be reported on external drives. Otherwise, click on the Partition tab in the DU main window.
3. Click on the Options button, set the partition scheme to GUID (only required for Intel Macs) then click on the OK button. 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, 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 will take 30 minutes to an hour or more 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.

My external USB drive became read-only

I migrated from a Macbook (black) to a new Macbook Pro (late 2008 model) a week ago. Everything seemed to work fine except that I can't write to an external USB drive (worked fine with the Macbook) from my new Macbook Pro. Disk utility indicated I only have read-only access and didn't give me a way to change the permissions. The drive still works normally (read-write) with the old Macbook.
The drive was formatted as Mac OS extended (journaled.) Both computers are running 10.5.5 when this happened. I have since upgraded my Macbook Pro to 10.5.6 but won't have an opportunity to test it with my drive till January.
I know I can re-format the drive with Macbook pro but I don't want to lose the data. I have no other storage to temporary hold the data (about 450G worth.) I tend to change computers every 6 months or so. This will continue to be a problem for me. I am looking for a nice permanent solution.
Thanks.

Welcome to Apple Discussions:
You probably do not have write access to the drive, if it came from a Mac with another account.
In a terminal run the command
ls -al /volumes
and see what permissions the drive has.
You should see something like
drwxrwxrwx 1 nero nero 16384 Dec 18 13:02 TravelDrive
Where "nero" is the name of the user who has access to the drive. Notice that on my drive, everyone has read, write, execute privileges on the drive.
Message was edited by: nerowolfe

How can I migrate an Aperture library from an external HDD with Mac OS Extended (Journaled, Encrypted) format?

How can I migrate an Aperture library from an external HDD with Mac OS Extended (Journaled, Encrypted) format?
I used to store my pictures on an external hard drive using the latest version of Aperture. Now I tried migrating my Aperture library to Photos. However, after a short moment an error message popped up telling me that "Photos was unable to make a copy of your library before preparing it. Photos does not have the necessary permissions...".
My external HDD doesn't need any permission repairs nor is the system prohibited to read from or write to it.
Thanks for any advice in advance!
Gohtac

My guess is that the encryption is the problem for the new app.

Mini doesn't always connect bluetooth and external (USB) drives on boot

I have had a new Intel mini for 4 months now (we also have a PPC G5, which we love). In the last few weeks the mini started to not connect my Bluetooth keyboard and mouse, nor recognize some of my USB peripherals when booting up. When this happens, it also makes a repeated "startup sound - bong!" echo when the start button is pressed. I have two external USB drives, one 500GB Phantom and one 500GB WD MyBook. When the Apple logo appears at boot, I can see the activity lights flashing on the drives as the BIOS interrogates the USB connections, but after the Leopard start up desktop appears, the only drive shown is Macintosh HD, the mouse pointer is at the top left of the display and will not move, nor will the keyboard do anything. I have read every post on this subject and tried all of the resets suggested. Sometimes this works after a few attempts, sometimes it takes 6 or more tries - disconnecting all cables, and turning the computer on again and again. Occasionally the WD MyBook drive appears on the desktop, yet still the Bluetooth is unresponsive and the other drive absent. I am getting frustrated having to disconnect everything and trying to boot this thing up, sometimes for one hour or longer before I can use it properly (all of my work is on the external drives).
There MUST be a firmware update for this by now, because I see that I am not the only one experiencing these problems, and this is obviously some problem with how the BIOS is communicating with the bus.

Hi amyta pdx-
I'd be careful jumping to conclusions or the troubleshooting process may get clouded. For one thing those WD drives are junk and most people using them eventually have problems.
What happens with everything disconnected from the Mac except a mouse connected to a USB port on the Mac and the monitor connected to the video port only?
Luck-
-DP

Trouble accessing files on external USB drive after 10.6.8 update

Upgraded to Mac 10.6.8 on my MacBook Pro (I'm not a techie, but the "About This Mac" thingy says 2.53 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 4 GB 1067 MHz DDR3 - I assume that means something to somebody). Since the upgrade, I've been having problems accessing data on an external HD connected via USB - there were no issues before the upgrade, but now it's impossible to even navigate to a particular file or subfolder half the time, as the process freezes 95% of the time (every so often I am able to get through, for no obvious reason) - usually I just get what looks like an empty folder and a little spinning thing in the bottom right-hand corner. Sometimes when I do get to a file - say it's a ZIP file - I'll try to unZIP it and the process will hang; if I try to drag it to the desktop and unZIP it there, I can't get it to copy to the desktop, I just get the "copying files" box and a bar that never shows any progress, it just hangs at zero bytes out of whatever it might be.
Also having intermittent issues with another external USB drive, which is the one I use for Time Machine - about one in every five backup attempts is successful, the rest of the time I get a message saying the backup couldn't be performed.
I have two external FireWire drives as well, and I'm having no trouble with either of those - so I'm assuming the problem is USB-related (and 10.6.8 related, since none of this was happening before the upgrade).
So - I'm wondering if anybody else is having the same issues, and f there's a solution that a non-techie like me could handle that won't make blood come out of my ears.
Cheers!

Thanks baltwo - the PRAM tip was helpful. For some reason I still have trouble accessing a few files, I'm putting that down to them being somehow corrupted. Eric, thanks, but I tried using Disk Utility and the communication problems I was having with the drive meant that the repair couldn't be performed. I may try again now that that side of things seems to be running a little more smoothly. Anyway, thank you both!

When I try to format an external usb drive the progress bar only goes half way then freezes up can anybody help please

When I try to format an external usb drive the progress bar gets to half way then freezes , or stops and what ever time I allow it never gets any futher on , I have to go to the task bar and click quit to get on and the usb drive is not formatted is there a fault with my disk utility program I have updated the system
to lion 10.7.2
Can anybody advise please

Are these new external drives? How are the currently formatted? Have you tried doing this:
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. Under the Volume Scheme heading set the number of partitions from the drop down menu to one. Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Options button, set the partition scheme to GUID then click on the OK button. 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.
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.

External USB Drive (MAC OS Extended) Problem

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