I want to save important files/programs on an external hard drive, delete EVERYTHING on my computer, install snow leopard, and reload everything i saved on to a clean slate. Is this possible/practical?

I was just thinking that it would be better to wipe the entire hard drive clean and reinstall some programs rather than go through and move certain things to the trash. Basically rebuild my software and file collection from the ground up, omitting what is unnecessary. Then again, I have no idea what i'm doing.
My macbook was purchased in late 2008. 2gb RAM. OS X 10.5.6. It's been going very slow lately so i decided i would look up how to improve. Snow leopard was recommended as well as changing my RAM. And so here I am.
I don't have an external hard drive so i was going to just compress all my files and save them to my emac via ethernet. would they be harmed?
also, i have alot of projects in ableton (a music recording/writing program). Would saving and transferring them be just as simple as finding the song? or are other components of a certain song saved in other locations?
sorry this is so lengthy. i should probably stick with something simple but i just want things to run as smoothly as possible for as long as possible
thanks very much

Here's some info that may be helpful.
Installing Snow Leopard: What you need to know
http://www.macworld.com/article/1142454/install_snow_leopard.html.
You should get a Firewire connected hard drive and backup your MB's HD to it. That way, if something goes wrong during the installation, you can recover your current sytem, apps and files. After the SL install, you can use the external HD for frequent backups.
 Cheers, Tom

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Read through the links here, calm down and take your time.
https://discussions.apple.com/community/notebooks/macbook_pro?view=documents

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Thanks Dirk,
Tried your suggestion various ways but it had no effect the download button was still greyed out and the install button would not activate will keep trying to find a solution. I dont want to boot from the external hard drive that has Lion on mainly because it is a usb HD and the connection to my wireless modem slows the connection rate and downloading would take about ten hours

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How do i import my library from an external hard drive. Had to export it as had to reinstal windows due to a conflict between windows and i-tunes. Wen i try to import nothing happens despite selecting the file. Can you import from an i-phone to i-tunes?

What do you mean bye exported the library?
There is nothing to export or import.
The correct process to backup the iTunes library would be to copy the ENTIRE iTunes folder from the computer to the external drive.

I can not save ai files on to my external hard drive

hi
i have just brought a a new mac pro book
i am trying to save ai file on my external hard drive which illustrator will not allow me!
i have tried to save it on my desktop then tranfer on harddrive which it will not allow me!
it allows me to open files from the hard drive but not save!!!
please help!

The device is formatted for Windows, as NTFS. The format is readable, but not natively writable on a Mac. To write to the device, you must either reformat it (erasing all the contents) or install third-party software to enable write access to NTFS.

How to import previous Itunes database from external hard drive into Itunes on new computer

I need to know how to import a previous iTunes data base that is saved onto an external hard drive into the iTunes library on my new computer

There's only one way to do this.
Copy the iPhoto Library from the old machine to the Pictures Folder on the new machine. You have to copy it as a single item. Then open it, don't import it.
Regards
TD

I want to use the Thunderbolt connection for an external hard drive

I want to use the Thunderbolt connection for an external hard drive - so what port would I use on the MacBook Pro 13" for the display monitor. Thank you!

This is not the forum for MacBook Pro owners.
You just need to reformat the drive in Disk Utility and erase the drive and have Mac HFS.
If you did need to use NTFS then you would not want -3G but Paragon NTFS for OS X x. 10.0
Or buy something that isn't pre-formatted to Windows NT file system.
First though make sure you have backups of your system. TimeMachine being used now?
http://macperformanceguide.com/Mac-TimeMachine-drive.html
http://www.apple.com/support/timemachine/
Maybe cleanout some files you don't need.
Install a larger notebook hard drive even.
http://www.macsales.com/firewire has a lot of choice in Mac compatible drives and enclosures so you don't need to worry about Fantom not working at some point.
https://discussions.apple.com/community/notebooks/macbook_pro
https://discussions.apple.com/community/mac_os/mac_os_x_v10.6_snow_leopard

I want to edit Pictures that are on my External Hard Drive Using iPhoto without having to import them every time, it was suggested to me to use Aperture. any advise is appreciated

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Aperture is a nice program, I use it myself for it's adjustment and light editing capabiities.
You can save a vault on another drive.

I want to take files from my PC (using a Seagate external hard drive) then plug this Seagate External hard drive into my Mac Book Pro and move the files from the Seagate External Hard drive onto my Time Capsule. I do not want to put these files on my Mac

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Mixing files with data is not always great idea.
See info here.
Q3 http://pondini.org/TM/Time_Capsule.html
Why not just connect the PC directly to the TC by ethernet and copy the files over?
It is hugely faster and much less mucking around.
In windows load the airport utility for windows.. if you have not already as this will help you access the drive.
There is more info here.
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1331

Where can I find the files using up my external hard drive?

I have a 1TB iMac and have two external hard drives attached to keep the computer free of hard drive use for two reasons: Disk 1-is a 250GB hard drive I have dedicated to perform Time Machine backups of my home folder. Disk 2-is a smaller 120GB hard drive I keep my compete iTunes library of music in case the computer has a malfunction, so all the work I've done putting the library together will be secure. Here's the thing...the iMac's hard drive is hardly used, just as I want containing about 150GB total. Meanwhile, the Time Machine disk is nearly full with 225GB used, and just 25GB remainibg. The hard drive with the iTunes files looks pretty good too using about 70GB of it's 120GB. I believe Time Machine is in no way, backups the iTunes library just the iMac.
How can I figure out where the additional space is getting used up on that disk? I do have a couple of extra logins I use for alternate use such as a different iPhoto library I want kept seperate from mine, but I did not think the backup was saving those files as they are not even under the Time Machine setup.
Can anyone advise why the backup is larger than the use of the computer? I knew when I dedicated a smaller hard drive to back up a larger one that it was possible the backup drive would get too full, but I can figure out what's happening. I've erased the Time Machine disk and allowed it do a completlely new backup and again, it's always sigificantly larger.
Thanks!

Okay...I have some more information and perhaps we are getting closer. On the 250GB, first I went into that disk and used Disk Utilty to re-format it once using Mac OS Extended (Journaled) then a second time, zeroing it out. I did a screen shot to review if needed, and both times it looked perfect...249GB available. Then I went into the Time Machine preferences to get ready to backup again, and it had not excluded the other external 120GB with iTunes so I excluded it. I may has previously, never noticed in that screen that it takes a bit of time for it to calculate the information to save. I may have just clicked on it quickly without reviewing it first. Today I did, and gave it time to calculate. At one point the actual 250GB itself, showed up and I excluded it too like the 120GB. After it finished, the calculations are still it wrong - claiming it has a 200GB backup when the iMac either contains 150GB (based on when I do Get Info) on it or from OmniDisk which calculated about 100GB. I have not allowed Time Machine to do a backup yet, until this discrepancy can be clear.
One thing that I thought I had seen or reviewed previous on the Time Machine settings was my home folder - I could be wrong but wanted to mention that. Another little tidbit to ponder an well is that I have a files of icons that I use for the Hard Disks, and a few folders where I Get Info on the Icon and on the destination and just cut and paste. I did that today to the 250GB after zeroing, but while I was in the Time Machine settings the change was deleted and neither the manufactures icon was there nor mine, and it has the default blue-green one the software uses. I know, because my sister's is that way on her system-unchanged.
Feedback?

I can not delete or copy new files to my Iomega external hard drive

Hi,
I can not delete or copy new files to my Iomega external hard drive. Opening hard drive folder I can see that I can not overwrite it. I have heard that I need to install some program for the external hard drive to operate properly in Mac.
Please help what to install or there is some other option.
Thnx

I'm not the expert on this since I have never done it. It sounds like you may need a data rescue program like Data Rescue III. I believe you can download a demo and see if you can see the files. If you can, then you can buy the program and retrieve the files. I don't know if Disk Utility can restore them--I think they have to be visible but this is not something I have ever had to do.
In the meantime, don't do anything with the drive--you don't want to overwrite any files. Hopefully all or most of the files are still there and you will be able to retrieve them. The less the drive is used, the better your chances are of retrieving the data.
Forgive me for not realizing that there were files on the drive that you wanted to save. Upon re-reading your question, I now see that there were. I should have known to warn you, and my bad that I didn't.
Good luck!

Since installing Snow Leopard and Lion two weeks ago, my iTunes program opens seemingly at will. It usually starts playing music, too. What is causing this?

Since installing Snow Leopard and then Lion on my Intel-based iMac two weeks ago, my iTunes program seems to open at will whenever the computer is on. It often begins playing music, as well. What is causing this and how do I make it stop?

There are ways to minimize, mitigate, and help avoid a lot of problems.
Bootable backups.
Zeroing a drive twice before using, and format it with SL DVD Apple Disk Utility for sure.
Even a clean install should import old apps without having to reauthorize.
If you must do an upgrade, do it from the SL DVD, after repairing the drive and be sure to use the SL version of Alsoft Disk Warrior (4.2).
Wait six months before jumping on a new OS.
10% is still too many. Yes, it is more sensitive to RAM and hard drive errors, doesn't like some controllers; most ext hdd cases; and enough software to make for test-only status. And it only IDs some known incompatible applications, drivers, extensions, etc and does not remove even those always in best manner.
Plus, there are problems with the new Rosetta and the cache files it now uses. So some apps and plug-ins will cause more trouble. Not all are ready. Good reason to hold off for the months it takes.
Other devices act different as far as on/off behavior.
(Migrating from G5s to Mac Pro can cause all kinds of problems, weird behavior, sluggish system, and why anyone that went down that road was strongly recommended to NOT use Migration Assistant for any of their applications, and to ONLY do clean/fresh installs of any apps. If you skipped that day, didn't read the Guide to M.A., or didn't want to do fresh installs then, your system could have been on borrowed time. If you did do clean install of applications, great.
Installing SL can result in a corrupt directory - I think and it "seems" to be happening, but no real proof, just gut feeling and instinct (underlying file system problem? weak sectors that pre-existed waiting to happen?).
Remember all the "there just aren't a lot of 64-bit drivers" for Vista and XP? it's come home to roost.
... my guess is not enough incense and offerings. To hop into TimeMachine and SuperDuper backup images and pull the 1TB for another day (week, month, year).

I imported my photos from an external hard drive into Lightroom, edited my photos but what next...?!

Adobe,
I imported my photos from an external hard drive into Lightroom, edited my photos and when i decided to export them the originals had not been updated and the deleted photos had not been deleted. How do i set it up so that once i import the photos, edit them and export they are then placed back in their original folder edited and updated?
I have managed to export the photos to another file but these were exported with an Adobe.xmp file. What is this and is this necessary?
Thanks for your help!

It's important to realise that LR is a DAM (Digital Asset Management) application - no images are actually imported into LR only links to where they are. Secondly, the details of any edits that you make to your images are kept only in the database and/or xmp files depending how you set this up in Preferences. In the general workflow e.g. edit in Lightroom, further edit in Photoshop and returning to LR then creating xmp files aren't really necessary. So just to emphasise - edits are stored in the LR's database, the original RAW images themselves don't change (non destructive editing). You can prove this yourself by desaturating an image (turning it into a B+W) and then look at the original images in Explorer - you'll see it's still being shown in colour.
Exporting an image is something different. By implication, you've finished with the image and perhaps want to save an image for posting on the web somewhere. Now assuming your not using any additonal and freely available LR export plug-ins, one way would be to Export a jpeg image to a folder on the desktop and this is allowed for in the Export dialogue. At this time LR reads any edits from it's database and applies those to the exported jpeg (or tiff) file it's going to send to the folder on the desktop.
As mentioned earlier, any edits and keywords etc are stored in LR's database - original RAW files remain untouched. XMP files also store the edits if LR is set up to create xmp files (in Preferences) but these are not really necessary unless you are going to be editing an already edited RAW file in another application. As an example - you import into LR's library a scanned negative. Now because strictly speaking LR isn't designed to work with negative images, you now open this file via Bridge into ACR and from here reverse the negative into a positive image. All fine and good except when you go back into LR what's shown is still a negative so what is needed is to update the metadata (LR > Metadata > Read Metadata from file) which will force LR to read the newly created metadata from the xmp file that Bridge generated. As already suggested, if you're happy editing your RAW files in LR and only LR then xmp files aren't really necessary - all the data being saved in LR's database.
Hope this has been of some help but if I might also suggest, purchasing a good book on LR from the outset thus getting to really know LR will pay dividends further on down the line.

Can you save your itunes and songs onto an external hard drive so that incase your computer crashes you will still have all your music?

Can you save your itunes and songs onto an external hard drive so that incase your computer crashes you will still have all your music?

The procedures below are for "moving" your library but as long as you don't delete it from your internal drive you are basically backing up.
iTunes: How to move your music to a new computer [or another drive] - http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4527
Simple answer: Copy your whole iTunes folder to the external drive. For subsequent backups you might want to learn about cloning and using a tool that only does incremental backups of recently changed items rather than copying all your files each time.

How do I save just my photos to an external hard drive and still access them in iphoto

I have a lot of photos that take up space on my hard drive. It is now full and I need to continue to use them but i need to load new photo also. How do i save the old photos onto an external hard drive and then still access them in iphoto?

This is where iTunes stores backups for different operating systems: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4946
I do not use a Windows machine, have a Windows Vista Dell I rarely startup now. But, from what I remember with Win boxes is, you will have to create on the external hard drive a file system like that one iTunes normally uses, and then in the iTunes preferences or control panel edit the location for the storage to specify the name of the external hard drive, or its letter code, with the name of that file system you created on the exernal drive.
I would also move all of the files from the internal file system to the external since you have now told iTunes that is where they are...before deleting from the internal drive, test iTunes to see that it goes where you want it to go.

I want to save important files/programs on an external hard drive, delete EVERYTHING on my computer, install snow leopard, and reload everything i saved on to a clean slate. Is this possible/practical?

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