Help a Novice Networ an external hard drive

Hi All.
We have 2 MacBooks, one running 10.4 & the other running 10.5. We also have an eMac that is running 10.4, that's primarily a web surfing box. The eMac is connected to our dsl router via Ethernet. The laptops connect via Airport. It's an AT&T wireless dsl router.
I just purchased a 1TB Seagate/Maxtor Netowrk drive (seen here: http://www.ecost.com/Detail.aspx?edp=42065822&navid=155441519 )
Here’s what I’d like to do with this drive:
- keep it connected to the network via Ethernet into the wireless modem
- store all my music to be accessed on any of the three computers in iTunes
- Backup via Time Machine (or otherwise) all three macs
- Share folders & files across the network
I’d like to have the drive appear as an icon on the desktop, or in finder, for all three machines, just like my other external drive does on the macbook when connected via firewire. Then, can’t I just double click the icon to “surf” through that drive?
Anyway, I’m writing because I’ve connected the drive & installed Maxtor’s mgt. software. I can connect to the drive through their software interface, but not through finder. There are no icons on any desktops, etc. The Maxtor software isn’t very user friendly at all, so I’d much prefer to use finder.
Is there any special settings in OSX that I should selecting or setting up to make all of this happen?

You will not be able to use Time Machine with a 3rd party Network Attached Storage (NAS) device. Or at least not easily.
Time Machine will only recognize a directly attached disk, an Apple Time Capsule, or another Mac OS X Leopard system offering a disk via file sharing.
Any other storage would require some hacking.
It may be possible to use some other backup solution. I guess a lot would depend on whether the Samba server and the file system in the NAS supports files greater than 4GB in size. I'm guessing it most likely does, but that is just a guess.
In theory it should be possible to store you music on the NAS. You might want to search the MacOSXHints.com web site for ways you could do this. Here is one suggestion:
<http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20090204122516833>
Creating a desktop icon should be possble. First you figure out how to create a share on the NAS. Then you figure out how to mount that share on your Mac. Hopefully the NAS instructions include information on creating shares and mounting them on a Mac.
Once you have the share mounted on the Mac, you create an Alias of the mounted Share. Unless Maxtor is doing something strange, the Share should be mounted at /Volumes/yourShareName. Clicking on your computer name on the Finder side-bar should bring up a folder containing all your mounted volumes, including the NAS share. You create an Alias from this (Finder -> File -> Make Alias).
Now drag the Alias into your System Preferences -> Account -> Startup Items, and when you login the share will be automatically mounted.

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Can you help a novice format an external hard drive?

Greetings.
I'm not very tech literate, so I hope you can help walk me through the following.
I have an external 250 GB firewire drive for back up, and I'd like to format and partition it as a bootable drive and also to back up my 2 internal 40 and 20 GB drives. I don't know how to do this. for example, I don't know whether to format the disk as OS Extended or OS Extended (Journalled). Also, when I backed up using Super Duper, I selected the "make this a bootable disk" option, but couldn't boot from it (It's currently a "Mac OS Extended" disk).
Also, when I have Disk Utility opened, why do I see 2 icons for the same disk? For example, my main drive says" 37.3 GB ST 340014 A", and an indented icon says "OS X" (which is what I named the drive). I know that Disk Utility can or cannot perform certain of its functions depending on which icon I select.
I know this is basi stuff for you...but not for me.
Thanks.
G4 Dual 450 Mac OS X (10.3.9) 1GB RAM

Extended Hard Drive Preparation
1. Open Disk Utility in the 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, if supported.) 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, if supported.) 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.
You can clone your system to the external drive as follows:
How to Clone Using Restore Option of Disk Utility
1. Select the destination drive on the Desktop and press COMMAND-I to open the Get Info window. At the bottom in the Ownership and Permissions section be sure the box labeled "Ignore Permissions on this Volume" is unchecked. Set Ownership and Permissions as follows: Owner=system with read/write; Group=admin with read/write; Other with read-only.
2. Open Disk Utility from the Utilities folder.
3. Select the backup or destination volume from the left side list.
4. Click on the Restore tab in the DU main window.
5. Select the backup or destination volume from the left side list and drag it to the Destination entry field.
6. Select the startup or source volume from the left side list and drag it to the Source entry field.
7. Double-check you got it right, then click on the Restore button.
For added precaution you can boot into safe mode before doing the clone.

Help/explanation needed - Using an external hard drive

Hi everyone,
I bought an external 250gb hard drive as my MBP was very close to full capacity. Yesterday, I had a bit of a scare...
1. I backed up my Aperture Library onto the external hard drive.
2. I had about 500 of my favourite images rated 5 star and so I selected these and set up a new project.
3. I went through my Aperture library deleting folders/projects that I have completed.
4. I went back into the 5 star ratings and they did not exist. I assume this is because I deleted the master files.
5. I wanted to have the 5 star images on my laptop and so I connected my external hard drive once again. [This is where I felt I lost control and understanding of what was going on].
6. I looked for the seperate Aperture files but could only find a file called Aperture Library. I clicked on this but nothing happened at all [I had thought that it would open up Aperture with the previous library].
7. I dragged the library onto my desktop and waiting for all the images to reload onto my laptop. I then saw that everything was as it was previously, i.e. all the files and images existed. However, my hard drive space was even lower [I assume this was because the current workflow that I had left on the laptop was now duplicated?].
8. Then I got a message saying my iDisk space is critically low and may damage my Aperture library. Moments later the majority of my images disappeared and a red space appeared where every photo had previously been. Since I have 2 weddings that I am yet to deliver I was very panicked. I tried to drag and drop the Aperture library once again and the message came back that the operation could not be completed due to the current file already existing.
9. I unplugged the external hard drive and the photos re-appeared [much to my delight]. However, my concern is that I really don't understand what happened and more importantly why. I will need access to the data on the external hard drive in the event in the near future and am worried that the same thing will happen next time I connect it.
As a result of all this I have some questions, as follows:-
- Have I adopted the completely wrong approach to backing up data?
- Can the master files be compressed as I shoot RAW and these are huge files?
- Why could I not use the Aperture library stored on the external hard drive without downloading it back onto the laptop?
and a more general question about file storage...
- I am confused as to how much hard drive space is being used on my MBP. I have 13gb in Aperture, 1gb in iTunes and 1gb in iPhoto. However, I only have 50gb available, so half the capacity is currently being used. I know that Aperture and Garageband applications use about 10gb between them and there is of course the operating system, but 50gb in total seems a lot. On investigation in the finder screen I see that on my personal drive the Aperture, iTunes and iPhoto data is stored there. However, it is also stored under pictures and music respectively. Does this mean that it is storing duplicate copies of this data and that is the explanation for such high hard drive usage? If this is the case, can one be removed?
I appreciate that this has been a long email, but I felt it was important to illustrate the steps I have taken. As you will no doubt glean from this post I am not the most computer literate person. Any help/explanation would be most appreciated.
Many thanks,
Jamie

Hi Jamie.
I am not sure what went wrong with your setup but I will let you know my configuration as an example and you can decide if you think it is a good way to have it. I am asuming you are using ver 1.5?
Like you I have only a Laptop (G4 17" 1.5Ghz 2 Gig Ram - would love a macbook) so hard disk space is a premium. I also have an external firewire drive to hold all the HiRes RAW images. When I download my images from the Camera I do it manually into folders on the external drive (Cataloged by Date and maybe description of location). I then Import the images from those folders into Aperture but use the option when importing to "Store Files - In their current location".
My Aperture library file is on my laptop so all that it has to store is the "Preview" file that gets generated automatically (in the preferences I have it set up to the resolution of my laptop 1440pix so that if I did a slide show it is only as big as my screen - anything more is a waste of disk space IMO.)
I do it this way so that it is easy to find and work on my files with other programs such as Photoshop by going straight to the image rather than exporting from Aperture.
Obviously I cant edit the RAW files while the drive is disconnected but I can still do ratings and keywords without the original files being there.
I hope this helps.
Regards
Andrew
G4 17inch Mac OS X (10.4.8) 2 Gigs RAM

Need help moving music collection from external hard drive to Macbook Pro

     I just bought a Macbook Pro today after my Windows desktop was bricked a few weeks ago. Luckily, I didn't lose the most important files on my pc, my music, because it was all on my Zune, as well. So, I borrowed an external hard drive, copied all of the music from my zune onto a friend's pc, and then copied it again from their pc to the external. Finally, I just plugged the external into my new mac, copied the folder within it holding my music, and hit "paste item" in the "Automatically Add to iTunes" folder. Initially, everything seemed to work perfectly, however, after transferring a little over 7 of my 54gb of music, an error message appeared saying that the operation was ending because it could not transfer all files.
     I then tried playing a file off of the hard drive, a wma, and received a prompt that the file was incompatible with Quicktime player, the default for no apparent reason. I tried then opening it with iTunes, and nothing happened, as far as I could see. Naturally, my next step was to google how one would transfer wma files to a mac, and, to make matters even more confusing, all of the results seemed to tell me that iTunes should automatically convert wma files to mp3, which does not seem to be happening in my case.
     I'm still not sure why this isn't working, as I'm sure more than 7gb of my music collection is non-wma, so that doesn't even seem to be the sole issue. Any help with importing my collection would be hugely appreciated, as I'm enjoying my mac so far, but will have to return it if I can't get music on here.
     Thanks.

One problem is that iTunes for Mac can't handle WMA files, iTunes for Windows will convert them, but not iTunes for Mac. When you add unprotected WMA files to your iTunes library (Windows only), iTunes converts them to new files that iTunes can play, based on your import settings. See if you can use your friend's PC to do this. If the borrowed PC has iTunes, create an alternate iTunes library so you don't mess up your friend's library. This explains how: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1589
This support document might be helpful: iTunes: About the Add to Library, Import, and Convert functions, http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1347

URGENT HELP: How to reformat an external hard drive?!

We purchased a Desk Hammer external hard drive with USB. My hubby plugged it into his Mac G4/OS 8.6 and when it was recognized, he selected to format it for Mac only. We needed it to be ISO Whatever so I can use it on my Windows systems too. The Desk Hammer people are no help with how to get access to this thing and reformat it (in fact, WARNING they say they do not even support Mac usage for these drives!). What can I do to reformat it to work on the Windows side? thanks for any help....
Mac G4 Mac OS 8.6 or Earlier Mac OS is 8.6

Windows machines support Windows formats some of the time.
The Mac formats and supports many common formats, and is nice about it.
You use the exact same utility you used to format it for the Mac, only you select MS-DOS as the type. If the drive is of a modest size, that is all you need to do.
The Mac will also happily read and write files on it, even though it is an MS-DOS drive. It may not properly show their Icons (everything may be generic MS-DOS documents) until the files are copied to a Mac drive.
A very large drive will need a third-party utility to format all the space on it into Windows format.
ISO-whatever and High Sierra and a few others are CD-only formats, you will not be able to format a Hard drive to that format.

URGENT HELP: Need to reformat an external hard drive for Mac/Win!

We got a Desk Hammer external hard drive and my hubby chose to format it as Mac Only when it first initialized. We needed it to be formatted for Mac/Win usage. Now we cannot figure otu how to reinitialize and reformat it. It's been years since I messed with his Mac. Help--right now we just have a big old doorstop instead of a hard drive! BTW Desk Hammer is no help with support (I guess that's why they were on sale); their website isn't even complete!

Use the Disk Utility application found in /Applications/Utilities to format the Drive as MS-DOS File System. This will be readable by both Mac and Windows platforms.
Hope this helps! bill
1 GHz Powerbook G4 Mac OS X (10.4.8)

Need help reinstalling Yosemite/Question about external hard drive

I have an early MacBook Pro and I have to reinstall Yosemite because I've been getting nothing but spinning beach balls, slow loading, lag in type showing up, and wi-fi issues. I took the laptop to the Genius Bar at the Apple store last week and they ran diagnostics on everything and all was perfectly OK. No hardware issues, no memory issue and he said my laptop was very clean. He saw the spinning beach ball many times while he was working on my laptop and suggested that I turn off File Vault as that could be causing the slowdown. He said if that didn't work (it didn't) to buy an external hard drive (which I received today) and to back up everything through Time Machine then reinstall Yosemite. I specifically bought an external HD that says "for Mac" and as soon as I connected it Time Machine opened and did the backup.
Now these are my questions. Are all my photos on iPhoto, and my Word for Mac documents backed up so that when I reinstall Yosemite, everything is going to be right where I left it? Will I lose Word for Mac and have to reinstall it? Isn't Word for Mac a one time use/install and will I have trouble and have to call Microsoft to input my authentication key in again and will they let me? I know silly questions but I'm really worried about losing stuff.
Also step-by-step detailed instruction on how to reinstall Yosemite would really be appreciated. Thank you!

YoJoLo wrote:
Are all my photos on iPhoto, and my Word for Mac documents backed up so that when I reinstall Yosemite, everything is going to be right where I left it?
If you have taken the backup using the Time machine then there is nothing to worry as all your photos from iPhotos and Word for mac documents are backup safely by your time machine.
Only keep one thing in mind that the external HDD which you use for the time machine backup should have the capacity size of about 3-4 times that of your backup data size. Or else, the time machine external drive will start deleting the files if the external drive is about to be full.
YoJoLo wrote:
Will I lose Word for Mac and have to reinstall it? Isn't Word for Mac a one time use/install and will I have trouble and have to call Microsoft to input my authentication key in again and will they let me?
You absolutely don’t have to reinstall the Word for mac if its install in the first place because Time machine will backup the system installed files of your MS Word which you had installed.
Word for mac is a one time install and you don’t have to call Microsoft for any authentication key after you have restored your Word backup files from the time machine drive. As I said before the time machine will backup your Word system installed files leaving you no chance to reinstall it again.
YoJoLo wrote:
Also step-by-step detailed instruction on how to reinstall Yosemite would really be appreciated. Thank you!
Here, Yosemite reinstall procedure......
Important: To reinstall OS X, you must be connected to the Internet. Make sure your power adapter is plugged in. Reinstall OS X using the built-in recovery disk.
In the menu bar, choose Apple menu > Restart. Once your Mac restarts (and the gray screen appears), hold down the Command and R keys.
Select Disk Utility, then click Continue.
Select your startup disk on the left, then click the Erase tab.
Choose Mac OS Extended (Journaled) from the Format menu, enter a name, then click Erase.
Important: Erasing the disk removes all the information from the disk. Be sure to back up the information you want to keep to an external device.
After the disk is erased, choose Disk Utility > Quit Disk Utility.
Select Reinstall OS X, click Continue, then follow the onscreen instructions.
Hope this helps.....

Need help using music library on external hard drive

Here is my scenario. I am hoping some one can help me as I have been having a heck of time trying to figure this out. I am what you would call newbie to Mac(I just purchased macBook) so bear with me).
I have a iTunes library on an external hard drive that was created using Windows PC machine. I now would like to use the same library on my Mac. How can I get the Mac to connect to the iTunes Music on the external hard drive?
This is what I have done so far. I have been able to network the Mac with my current network so it does see the external hard drive.
BTW, I would like to achieve this without having iTunes open on Windows machine. I know about the sharing option in iTunes but I have discovered that it only works if I have iTunes open on the Windows machine. This may not always be the case so this is why i am hoping their is an alternative to get the mac to connect to the library on the external hard drive.
I look forward to help on this one.
...Bruce

Maybe I did not explain myself clearly. All I want to do is be able to listen to the music in my itunes library on external hard drive on my new MacBook. I am thinking all I will have to do is create the itunes database file on my Mac using the music in my library(on external HD).

Need help importing HD footage from external hard drive

I have an external hard drive with some footage from a friend. I cannot view the footage either in QT or through importing to FCP. I have version 4.5 of FCP HD. The audio works on the clips, but the video does not. Im guessing it might be a format issue, as the footage is HD footage shot at 24P. I've tried opening a separate timeline and changing the settings there, but that didnt seem to work. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

I'm guessing that the footage is HDV, and FCP 4.5 cannot work with HDV. That format came out over a year after FCP 4.5 was released. FCP 4.5 was dubbed FCP HD because it worked with DVCPRO HD footage natively. HDV support didn't hit FCP until 5.0.
You have options. Because HDV came out when FCP 4.5 was in use and didn't work with it, a couple companies made solutions to import this footage. www.lumierehd.com and www.hdvxdv.com.
BUT...that will get you the HDV footage at 29.97...60i. HDV 24p support didn't arrive until FCP 5.1.2. So you can try those solutions and see what happens, but most likely you'll have to upgrade to the latest version of FCP...6.0.2
Shane

Help With Airport Extreme and External Hard Drive

I just purchased the Airport Extreme and I couldn't have been happier. I have attached my western digital external hard drive, but I have run into a slight problem/dilemma which I'm hoping someone who is apple savvy can help me out.
I live in a house with a couple of other guys and so I put all of my movies and media onto the hard drive so we can stream it throughout the house, but how do I make sure that someone won't accidently delete the files (The copies on the hard drive are the only ones I have)? I have tried to right click "get info" and change the sharing & permissions properties on the folders that I don't want deleted, but it doesn't save the changes or even allow me to select another option other than Read & Write. I formated the hard drive with the disk utility before I connected it to the AirPort so I know that it has nothing to do with the format of the drive. I also tried to create different user accounts for each roomate so that they could view the files (Read Only) but I get an error message explaining that if I continue, the contents of the hard drive will not be accessible. I'm sure its something simple but I'm obviously missing it.
Thanks!

Airport Utility under Disks/File Sharing has guest access rights.

Need help on connecting USB: 300GB external hard drive to wireless router

Hello,
I am trying to connect USB2.0 Maxtor 300GB external hard drive to my wireless router. Tried using Linksys new product NSLU2 which allows any USB cable external hard drive to NSLU2 device/network storage hub and then connect this NSLU2 directly to wireless router with the help of 10/100 Ethernet cable which allows to access external hard drive wirelessly.
Unfortunately Linksys NSLU2 is designed to supports USB external drives up to 250GB only.
Can any one advice me if there is any device I can use to connect my external hard drive to wireless router and access files without connecting/carrying USB external drive?
Any help is greatly appreciated.
Thanks in advance!
Arvind

Have a look at http://www.ximeta.com and their solutions. Especially
http://www.ximeta.com/web/products/ndenclosure1_en.php might be interesting, as you already have a HD.
Regards, Martin

Please Help - Can't send to External Hard Drive

I am in the project manager - I am copying and sending to new location - E Drive, external hard drive.
But, when I try it stops and says this:
"There was a problem... please make sure you have enough disk space..."dude, i got 500gigs and the project is 13 gigs (so that's not the problem) ... then it says: "make sure you have the correct user privileges to complete the operation."
what?
This is my software, my license, my computer, and my project. of course I have user privileges.
Please help...

There's a chance that nothing's wrong with your drive, and that it's one particular piece of media in your timeline that's choking the project trimmer & causing it to abort with a generic error.
I'm guessing that you're probably cutting an hour-long DV project. Are any of your clips not DV? Anything ripped from a DVD, perhaps? If you suspect certain clips are tripping you up, try removing them temporarily (make a backup of your master project file, just in case!) & try the trimmer again.
If you can't make an educated guess, you can fall back on this method: make a copy of your project. Delete half of the timeline; trim again. Does it fail? If so, split the remainder in two, trim again. Keep going until it doesn't fail anymore. In this manner, you'll be able to narrow down what clip(s) is giving you trouble.
If you do pinpoint a particular clip that won't trim, please let me know what it is. I'd like to take a look...
Cheers

HELP!! Problems using external hard drive

I have moved my iTunes music library from my internal hard drive on my laptop to a new external hard drive in order to free up space on my laptop. The problem I now experience is that when my external hard drive is conected and turned on, my computer will not recognize my iPod. When I turn the external hard drive off, my computer will then recognize my iPod. I can use one or the other but I can't use both at the same time. Because of this problem I can't access my iTunes music library with my iPod in order to update my iPod with new music that has been added to the music library on the external hard drive.
Is it that I need a Firewire conection possibly? If so, is there any way around that? Any help would be appreciated!
MY COMPUTER (purchased new in 2006)
Gateway Laptop running Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition
70 gig hard drive
1.83GHz - 480 MB Ram
MY IPOD (purchased new in 2006)
80 gig - video enabled
MY EXTERNAL HARD DRIVE (purchased new in 2007)
Western Digital "My Book" Essential Edition (USB)
250 gig (NTFS)

Change the drive letter for the external drive.
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=93499

HELP ! DELETED FILES On External Hard Drive

Hello,
I'm going crazy - I replaced/deleted files during a back-up.
I have a G5 2.5 (Tiger OS10.4.9) with 2- Glyph GTO50-250 firewire external Hard drives. *I only use the computer for audio recording* using Pro Tools LE 7.4. One hard drive is the recording drive(Drive 1) and the other is the back-up drive(Drive 2).
I accidently reversed my back-up process and replaced(not copied) folders on my main recording hard drive(Drive 1) with older back-up folders from my back-up hard drive(drive 2) during the back-up process. I lost current session folders and now only have older back-up sessions versions.Since I did this, I have left everything on, the computer,hard drives, everything.
Is there any way to recover the files that I replaced on the external recording hard drive(Drive 1)?
Any help would be greatly appreciated!
Thank you

*I select replace.
Ouch.
As for the rewriting of the file, it is possible that the actual physical sector is different, though directory scavenging won't find the old files due to the name of the replacement being the same.
Data Rescue II can be run in a free demo that will allow you to see what is recoverable.
The files may be there,, but then again, maybe not.
If it were me, I'd try the demo and look through all the files that it pulls.
You might get lucky.
You'll need a large (about double capacity) hard drive to use as a location for the recovered files and scratch.
If the data is irreplaceable, a data recovery service may be able to recover it, but will require sophisticated, expensive recovery techniques.
Good luck!

Help! Album artwork and external hard drive

Hello! I have a slight problem. I just moved my husband's iTunes and music to an external hard drive and all of the music showed up no problem. The problem is the artwork that he spent about 25 hours putting on iTunes. They disappeared!! I don't know where they went, where to look or anything! Help! He has over 11,000 songs and I don't want to have him start from scratch with the album covers. Any ideas of where they could be or how to hook them back up with iTunes? Any ideas would help!! Hopefully I can find this thread again...I've never used this message board before. Thank you!
Sandy
Windows XP

(5) On August 2, 2014, I switched from Comcast to AT&T and had the AT&T turn off the router function. (I have been using the router from my apple time capsule)
(6) Under Network I switched to bridge mode.
(7) And since August 2, 2014 my time capsule has not been backup.
If you got ATT to turn off router function in their modem..
Then 6. is wrong.. You cannot have the Network switched to bridge mode..
You must have it set to dhcp and nat.
That is also why you cannot backup.. the TC is off the network.
Please change back to router mode in the TC.
Ensure the internet tab shows dhcp and you create a wireless network.
Then power down the TC... power down the ATT modem.. wait about 20min (you can try 5min.. but it might not be long enough).
Power up the ATT modem.. wait 2min for things to flash lights in de right blinkin order.. then start the TC.
Open the airport utility and make sure your TC captured the public IP and is now working as the router.
That should fix that end of it.. the hotspot end??
Tell us what happens.

Help a Novice Networ an external hard drive

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