Unlockable External Drives
I have 2 1.4 TB external drives attached to an intel macmini running snow leopard server. For some reason today, the server started to display a bunch of error message when I was trying to copy a folder. So I restarted, only to get a grey screen with the rotating grey beach ball. Booted off the dvd and ran disk utilities, which seemed to fix things, or so I thought.
I lost all user accounts except primary admin. filemaker server trashed as is addressbook server. Open directory gone too. [I have a DVD that I store software on, but now the DVD is unreadable on the mac mini (and imacs as well). It was always readable.]
Worse yet, external drive Backup_A (connected via firewire to mac mini) is locked and says I don't have permissions to see contents. It is the clinic's central time machine drive for the mac mini server and the 3 other imacs. The 2nd external drive Backup_B (connected via usb to mac mini) backs up Backup_A drive. I also have an older 500 GB TimeCapsule that I just started to use to backup Backup_B. While I can seem to retrieve all critical data files, all 3 drives have the little "locked" icon. Get Info on each drive has no unlock checkbox. Trying to change sharing and permissions via Get Info is ineffective. Using terminal commands (cd /Volumes then chflags -R nouchg Backup_A) is ineffective as I get error statements telling me I do not have permission.
Before I erase all drives and start over I'd, well, NOT want to erase anything. Zillions of TM backup are within my reach.
This is a REAL pain. Suggestions?
Thanks, but problem remains.
VincensoXFIN
"Have you tried to edit ACL or posix with Server Admin ? ...Go to File sharing (when server name is selected) and select Volumes and Browse from the tabs. Now browse your way to the drive you want to set permissions to. You should instantly see the applied ACL and POSIX on the bottom of the screen. Whats going on there? It could help if you could post and tell what do you see there? Gray accounts? No accounts at all?"
Tried that before I posted on discussions. Probably should have said that before. Sorry. All permissions are listed as custom. Every time I try to SAVE permission changes from custom to full control or add a new user with admin permissions, permissions return to custom. I lost all accounts in workgroup manager except primary administrator. I then recreated all accounts, but that seemed to have no effect.
"If you can't re-create the permissions as they were. Try at least adding the server admin user to the ACL, full control, all files and folders all descendants, and then remember to save and propagate permissions. Use the small gear button on the bottom and select Propagate permissions."
As before, "saving" erases any changes I just tried to make.
"Hope you get this fixed. First, investigate, if you find something weird from the server admin, post it here, it might help to get better understanding of what has happened."
Sven-Goran Ljungholm1
"Again I would boot from CD and do a time machine restore."
I'm afraid I cannot do a TM restore as you suggested because the firewire TM disk is locked and I cannot seem to unlock it.
Summary So Far
I'm getting the impression that it may be easier (and safer) to erase the mac mini HD and do a full reinstall. Especially so since I have copies of critical data, obtained in a somewhat ham handed fashion. I'll await any advice you may proffer. I understand that "techies" (please take no offense) like to dive into fix this, the fix that stuff, but it seems an erase and install from a dvd is easy. Besides, its not like we're in the bad old days of installing FoxBase from 25 floppies. Thank God for that.
Again, I look forward to your advice ... Mike
Similar Messages
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Unable to unlock external drive or repair (but can change password)
I have a Freecom 1TB USB 2 external drive with a single partition with Filevault 2 encryption enabled.
The Mac Air detects the drive and prompts for the password to unlock. Prior to this problem it was retrieved automatically from my Keychain (entry still there). An incorrect password immediately gives the window shake. The correct password results in either a prompt to re-enter a password after few minutes or considerably longer.
Disk Utility (run from a standard or admin account or in recovery mode) appears to Verify and Repair the drive fine, but when the partition is selected I get:
Verifying volume “1,000”
Checking storage systemChecking volume.
disk3: Scan for Volume Headers
Invalid Volume Header @ 0: incorrect block type
Invalid Volume Header @ 999709908480: incorrect block type
disk3 is not a CoreStorage volume
Error: Storage system verify or repair failed.
The Repair option is not available.
Earlier I was getting an "Unable to examine /dev/disk3: Resource busy" message on Verifying the partition.
Earlier I also got a message in the details of drive Verify or Repair in Recovery mode of "transaction group 12: cksum mismatch", though the final result of the Verify and Repair stated the drive was okay.
Oddly I seem to be able to change the password, but nothing else including switching off encryption. When the later is attempted it appears to accept the password but then stops stating there was a problem (no other details).
I have a second external drive with Filevault2 enabled and this connects fine although a password is prompted for even though I saved it to my Keychain previously.
Suggestions very welcome! Preferrably to fix or if that is not possible ways to potentially retrieve some of the data.
Drive and Partition info from Disk Utility:
Name : Freecom Mobile Drive XXS Media
Type : Disk
Partition Map Scheme : GUID Partition Table
Disk Identifier : disk2
Media Name : Freecom Mobile Drive XXS Media
Media Type : Generic
Connection Bus : USB
USB Serial Number : C0001E86AA51
Device Tree : IODeviceTree:/PCI0@0/EHC2@1A,7
Writable : Yes
Ejectable : Yes
Location : External
Total Capacity : 1 TB (1,000,204,886,016 Bytes)
Disk Number : 2
Partition Number : 0
S.M.A.R.T. Status : Not Supported
Name : 1,000
Type : Encrypted Logical Partition
Disk Identifier : disk3
Mount Point : Not mounted
Disk Status : Online
File System : Mac OS Extended (Journaled, Encrypted)
Connection Bus : USB
Device Tree : IODeviceTree:/PCI0@0/EHC2@1A,7
Writable : Yes
Universal Unique Identifier : 7663BACA-6B14-3D7F-8C39-5A5319AE9F4B
Capacity : 999.71 GB (999,709,908,992 Bytes)
Owners Enabled : No
Can Turn Owners Off : Yes
Can Be Formatted : Yes
Bootable : Yes
Supports Journaling : Yes
Journaled : No
Disk Number : 3
Partition Number : 0I'll answer my own question, which may help others.
I found no solution and reformatted the drive.
Not sure if my question was poorly worded but after no response I tried one of the main paid support sites. The expert who took up my question didn't seem at first to be aware of encrypting external drives under Lion. No viable solution was found, so I gave up and reformatted the drives.
This is the third time I have had issues with the stability of OSX formatted external drives, so enough is enough. I'm sticking with FAT32 (the 4Gb limit isn't a major problem) for all my drives except my Time Machine drive. No encryption on that drive either. -
Unlocking external hard drive that was locked with time machine
I use a MBP Retina (Mid 2012) with OSX 10.9.4. I left the MBP at Apple for repair and they changed the mother card and reformatted my HD (SSD). Since I had a backup on a WD My Passport external drive I was not too worried to restore. I had clicked the option "password protected" on TM and therefore the external HD was password protected. I also copied pasted many files on the same external hard drive, in case TM would fail one day to operate I thought that I would still have my files ...
But I was very surprised that when I plugged in my external HD into my MBP it didn't recognize it at all. The external HD did not appear on the screen anymore. Nor in Finder. It appeared in Disk Utility but it could not be mounted. Basically it was impossible to access my data. After a while and talking with Apple Support on the phone we could reach a point where a window appeared asking me the password for the access to the HD. Unfortunately it didn't work. The . password was not recognized. Even though we had selected the right country with the icon upper right on the screen to make sure that we used the correct keyboard.
So finally I reinstalled completely the OSX (coming rom Lion all the way to the last OSX) on the MBP and finally I could restore it with my TM. I spent three days on this since it only worked with one OSX - don't remember honestly which one - and not the last one. Don't know why.
Anyway.
Today I have my MPB working but I miss all the files that are still on my external HD because I cannot access to it anymore. As I said the recovery happened all of a sudden with TM with a former OSX and not the 10.9.4. With this current OSX my HD does not appear on the desktop nor on finder. Nothing. It is locked by TM and I cannot even key in the password to unlock it. Useless to say that I have the password.
Any idea how to sort this out please ? ThanksThis might work. Courtesty of V.K.:
run the following terminal commands (copy and paste, please)
sudo chflags 0 /volumes/*
sudo chmod a+rx /volumes/*
you'll have to enter your admin password (which you won't see). that's normal. this should unlock your drives. -
Bitlocker on Windows 7 - External drive recovery with unlock password
Hi,
I am in the unfortunate situation where I have a 3tb external hard drive that I have 2 partitions on. The smaller, 250gb partition was encrypted using bitlocker for work purposes. Now that I have left my previous job, I wanted to decrypt the drive and use
it normally.
While trying to decrypt, the laptop ran out of battery, and the process was interrupted. In the morning when I tried to unlock the drive, I keep getting the message "Bitlocker Drive Encryption failed to recover from an abruptly terminated conversion"
Unfortunately, I do not any of the recovery keys (which were in the old work laptop). However, I have the password that I normally use to unlock the drive.
My question is: Is there any way I can use the bitlocker recovery tool to salvage my data using the normal unlock password?
Second, on the off chance that I can, do I need to output the data to an entirely new drive? If I use the option to output to an image file, will that still overwrite all the contents of the output drive?
Any help would be much appreciated. Please let me know if there is any more information I can provide. Thank you!Hi,
Have you tried using manage-bde command to decrypt this partition?
manage-bde -unlock Volume -pw *********
Andy Altmann
TechNet Community Support -
How to unlock a locked folder on external drive when locked checkbox greyed out
I use an external hard drive for Time Machine backups and to store some larger video files in a folder called Videos. The Videos folder on the external drive is now locked and I can't unlock it. I go to Get Info, hit the lock icon and enter my password, but the "Locked" checkbox is greyed out in the General section. In the Sharing and Permissions section, instead of displaying my name, it says "Fetching . . ." and I can't change the Privilege from "Write Only".
Anybody know what's causing this or how to fix it?
Thanks.Launch Terminal and copy/paste this command at the prompt…
chflags nouchg
Then drag the files you are having a problem with into Terminal. It will create the path, then press Return. -
I hope someone can help me....... after restoring my system from a timemachine backup I had some permission problems, so I opened get info on my HD and set the permissions and applied to enclosed items. I now have my two external hard drives ( 1 a USB 1 TB WD and another a 320 GB firewire(time machinebackup) locked, a small padlock at the bottom left of the icon and I can not access them...... It tells me I do not have sufficient access privileges.
Numerous restores and even a clean erase and install does not remove the locks ........
I can't even change the drives permissions ....... HELPFirst of all, NEVER EVER EVER use "apply to enclosed items" any system created folders and the startup drive!
to unlock the drives run the following terminal commands from an admin account for each affected drive.
sudo chflags nouchg /Volumes/"drive-name"
sudo chmod 775 /Volumes/"drive-name"
Put the name of the drive instead of drive-name in the above, keep the quotes.
You'll have to enter your admin password (which you won't see) after the first command. that's normal. -
How do I stop Finder from crashing when I try to view my external drive?
Hello,
I've read through a few similar posts, but the solutions don't seem to fit my problem. I was moving some files around on an external drive that I've been using for a year with no problems. While moving one file to another folder (within the drive, not between my computer and the drive), it froze up. After waiting for 20 minutes or so, I pulled the drive out and restarted the computer.
Now when I plug the drive back in, it shows up as usual, but when I click on it, Finder crashes immediately. I ran disk utility repair, and it says "The volume appears to be ok" in green, but it still crashes finder when I try to open it. Based on the advice of another post, I ran Console, and copied what I thought to be the relevant portion of the transcript, though I don't know what any of it means ("Uzak" is the name of the drive):
12/27/13 7:02:27.778 PM fseventsd: disk logger: failed to open output file /Volumes/Uzak/.fseventsd/000000000003357c (No such file or directory). mount point /Volumes/Uzak/.fseventsd
12/27/13 7:02:27.779 PM fseventsd: disk logger: failed to open output file /Volumes/Uzak/.fseventsd/000000000003357c (No such file or directory). mount point /Volumes/Uzak/.fseventsd
12/27/13 7:02:27.826 PM mds: (Error) LSOF: File '/Volumes/Uzak' (fd=11) left open on device 234881033
12/27/13 7:02:31.598 PM WDSecurityHelper: DriveDisappeared Called with a string of disk1
12/27/13 7:04:05.000 PM kernel: USBF: 881.622 [0xffffff800a66fc00] The IOUSBFamily is having trouble enumerating a USB device that has been plugged in. It will keep retrying. (Port 1 of Hub at 0xfd100000)
12/27/13 7:04:05.000 PM kernel: USBF: 881.622 [0xffffff800a66fc00] The IOUSBFamily was not able to enumerate a device.
12/27/13 7:04:07.000 PM kernel: USBMSC Identifier (non-unique): 575844314537324E4E453037 0x1058 0x7a8 0x1033
12/27/13 7:04:08.683 PM WDSecurityHelper: UnrecognizedDiskPeek Called with a string of disk1
12/27/13 7:04:08.737 PM WDSecurityHelper: UnrecognizedDiskPeek Called with a string of disk1s0
12/27/13 7:04:08.000 PM kernel: SAM Multimedia: READ or WRITE failed, SENSE_KEY = 0x05, ASC = 0x24, ASCQ = 0x00
12/27/13 7:04:08.000 PM kernel: SAM Multimedia: READ or WRITE failed, SENSE_KEY = 0x05, ASC = 0x24, ASCQ = 0x00
12/27/13 7:04:08.000 PM kernel: SAM Multimedia: READ or WRITE failed, SENSE_KEY = 0x05, ASC = 0x24, ASCQ = 0x00
12/27/13 7:04:08.000 PM kernel: SAM Multimedia: READ or WRITE failed, SENSE_KEY = 0x05, ASC = 0x24, ASCQ = 0x00
12/27/13 7:04:08.000 PM kernel: SAM Multimedia: READ or WRITE failed, SENSE_KEY = 0x05, ASC = 0x24, ASCQ = 0x00
12/27/13 7:04:08.958 PM WDSecurityHelper: UnrecognizedDiskPeek Called with a string of disk1s0s1
12/27/13 7:04:08.960 PM WDSecurityHelper: mountApproval Called for device disk1s0s2
12/27/13 7:04:08.961 PM WDSecurityHelper: Approved mount devices = (
12/27/13 7:04:08.962 PM WDSecurityHelper: The mounting of WD Unlocker on disk1s0s2 was not approved.
12/27/13 7:04:08.969 PM WDSecurityHelper: processDiskApperance for device disk1s0s2
12/27/13 7:04:08.999 PM WDSecurityHelper: encryptionStatus = 1
12/27/13 7:04:09.118 PM [0x0-0x16016].com.westerndigital.WDSecurityHelper: WDDevice::PerformDriveConfiguration
12/27/13 7:04:09.629 PM WDSecurityHelper: UnrecognizedDiskPeek Called with a string of disk2
12/27/13 7:04:09.712 PM WDSecurityHelper: mountApproval Called for device disk2s1
12/27/13 7:04:09.713 PM WDSecurityHelper: Approving mount of Uzak on disk2s1
12/27/13 7:04:09.836 PM WDSecurityHelper: processDiskApperance for device disk2s1
12/27/13 7:04:09.837 PM WDSecurityHelper: disk2s1 is not supported...
12/27/13 7:04:09.881 PM fseventsd: could not open <</Volumes/Uzak/.fseventsd/fseventsd-uuid>> (No such file or directory)
12/27/13 7:04:09.882 PM fseventsd: log dir: /Volumes/Uzak/.fseventsd getting new uuid: E6CE571A-E193-4549-94FC-0A76ACCEA37F
Sorry to dump all these lines of code, but if anyone can decipher them for me I'd be extremely grateful...If you don't already have a current backup, back up all data before doing anything else. This procedure is a diagnostic test. It changes nothing, for better or worse, and therefore will not, in itself, solve your problem. The backup is necessary on general principle, not because of anything suggested in this comment. There are ways to back up a computer that isn't fully functional. Ask if you need guidance.
Third-party system modifications are a common cause of usability problems. By a “system modification,” I mean software that affects the operation of other software — potentially for the worse. The procedure will help identify which such modifications you've installed, as well as some other aspects of the configuration that may be related to the problem.
Don’t be alarmed by the seeming complexity of these instructions — they’re easy to carry out. Here's a brief summary: In each of two steps, you copy a line of text from this web page into a window in another application. You wait about a minute. Then you paste some other text, which will have been copied automatically, back into a reply on this page. The sequence is copy; paste; paste again. That's all there is to it. Details follow.
You may have started the computer in "safe" mode. Preferably, these steps should be taken while booted in “normal” mode. If the system is now running in safe mode and is bootable in normal mode, reboot as usual. If it only boots in safe mode, use that.
Below are instructions to enter UNIX shell commands. They do nothing but produce human-readable output. However, you need to think carefully before running any program at the behest of a stranger on a public message board. If you question the safety of the procedure suggested here — which you should — search this site for other discussions in which it’s been followed without any report of ill effects. If you can't satisfy yourself that these instructions are safe, don't follow them.
The commands will line-wrap or scroll in your browser, but each one is really just a single long line, all of which must be selected. You can accomplish this easily by triple-clicking anywhere in the line. The whole line will highlight, and you can then copy it.
If you have more than one user account, Step 2 must be taken as an administrator. Ordinarily that would be the user created automatically when you booted the system for the first time. Step 1 should be taken as the user who has the problem, if different. Most personal Macs have only one user, and in that case this paragraph doesn’t apply.
Launch the Terminal application in any of the following ways:
☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)
☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.
☞ Open LaunchPad. Click Utilities, then Terminal in the icon grid.
When you launch Terminal, a text window will open with a line already in it, ending either in a dollar sign (“$”) or a percent sign (“%”). If you get the percent sign, enter “sh” and press return. You should then get a new line ending in a dollar sign.
Step 1
Triple-click anywhere in the line of text below on this page to select it:
PB=/usr/libexec/PlistBuddy; PR () { [[ "$o" ]] && printf '\n%s:\n\n%s\n' "$1" "$o"; }; PC () { o=$(grep [^[:blank:]] "$2"); PR "$1"; }; PF () { o=$($PB -c Print "$2" | awk -F'= ' \/$3'/{print $2}'); PR "$1"; }; PN () { [[ $o -eq 0 ]] || printf "\n%s: %s\n" "$1" $o; }; { system_profiler SPSoftwareDataType | sed '8!d;s/^ *//'; o=$(system_profiler SPDiagnosticsDataType | sed '5,6!d'); fgrep -q P <<< "$o" && o=; PR "POST"; o=$(( $(vm_stat | awk '/Pageo/{sub("\\.",""); print $2}')/256 )); [[ $o -gt 1024 ]] && printf "\nPageouts: %s MiB\n" $o; s=( $(sar -u 1 10 | sed '$!d') ); [[ ${s[4]} -lt 90 ]] && o=$( printf 'User %s%%\t\tSystem %s%%' ${s[1]} ${s[3]} ) || o=; PR "Total CPU usage"; [[ "$o" ]] && o=$(ps acrx -o comm=Process,ruid=User,%cpu | sed 's/ */:/g' | head -6 | awk -F: '{ printf "%-10s\t%s\t%s\n", $1, $2, $3 }'); PR "CPU usage by process"; o=$(kextstat -kl | grep -v com\\.apple | cut -c53- | cut -d\< -f1); PR "Loaded extrinsic kernel extensions"; o=$(launchctl list | sed 1d | awk '!/0x|com\.apple|org\.(x|openbsd)|\.[0-9]+$/{print $3}'); PR "Loaded extrinsic user agents"; o=$(launchctl getenv DYLD_INSERT_LIBRARIES); PR "Inserted libraries"; PC "cron configuration" /e*/cron*; o=$(crontab -l | grep [^[:blank:]]); PR "User cron tasks"; PC "Global launchd configuration" /e*/lau*; PC "Per-user launchd configuration" ~/.lau*; PF "Global login items" /L*/P*/loginw* Path; PF "Per-user login items" L*/P*/*loginit* Name; PF "Safari extensions" L*/Saf*/*/E*.plist Bundle | sed 's/\..*$//;s/-[1-9]$//'; o=$(find ~ $TMPDIR.. \( -flags +sappnd,schg,uappnd,uchg -o ! -user $UID -o ! -perm -600 \) | wc -l); PN "Restricted user files"; cd; o=$(find -L /S*/L*/E* {,/}L*/{A*d,Compon,Ex,In,Keyb,Mail/Bu,P*P,Qu,Scripti,Servi,Spo}* -type d -name Contents -prune | while read d; do ID=$($PB -c 'Print :CFBundleIdentifier' "$d/Info.plist") || ID=; ID=${ID:-No bundle ID}; egrep -qv "^com\.apple\.[^x]|Accusys|ArcMSR|ATTO|HDPro|HighPoint|driver\.stex|hp-fax|JMicron|microsoft\.MDI|print|SoftRAID" <<< $ID && printf '%s\n\t(%s)\n' "${d%/Contents}" "$ID"; done); PR "Extrinsic loadable bundles"; o=$(find /u*/{,*/}lib -type f -exec sh -c 'file -b "$1" | grep -qw shared && ! codesign -v "$1"' {} {} \; -print); PR "Unsigned shared libraries"; o=$(system_profiler SPFontsDataType | egrep "Valid: N|Duplicate: Y" | wc -l); PN "Font problems"; for d in {,/}L*/{La,Priv,Sta}*; do o=$(ls -A "$d"); PR "$d"; done; } 2> /dev/null | pbcopy; echo $'\nStep 1 done'
Copy the selected text to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C. Then click anywhere in the Terminal window and paste (command-V). I've tested these instructions only with the Safari web browser. If you use another browser, you may have to press the return key after pasting.
The command may take up to a few minutes to run, depending on how many files you have and the speed of the computer. Wait for the line "Step 1 done" to appear below what you entered. The output of the command will beautomatically copied to the Clipboard. All you have to do is paste into a reply to this message by pressing command-Vagain. Please don't copy anything from the Terminal window. No typing is involved in this step.
Step 2
Remember that you must be logged in as an administrator for this step. Do as in Step 1 with this line:
PR () { [[ "$o" ]] && printf '\n%s:\n\n%s\n' "$1" "$o"; }; { o=$(sudo launchctl list | sed 1d | awk '!/0x|com\.(apple|openssh|vix\.cron)|org\.(amav|apac|calendarse|cups|dove|isc|ntp|post[fg]|x)/{print $3}'); PR "Loaded extrinsic daemons"; o=$(sudo defaults read com.apple.loginwindow LoginHook); PR "Login hook"; o=$(sudo crontab -l | grep [^[:blank:]]); PR "Root cron tasks"; o=$(syslog -k Sender kernel -k Message CReq 'GPU |hfs: Ru|I/O e|find tok|n Cause: -|NVDA\(|pagin|timed? ?o' | tail -n25 | awk '/:/{$4=""; print}'); PR "Log check"; } 2>&- | pbcopy; echo $'\nStep 2 done'
This time you'll be prompted for your login password, which you do have to type. Nothing will be displayed when you type it. Type it carefully and then press return. You may get a one-time warning to be careful. Heed that warning, but don't post it. If you see a message that your username "is not in the sudoers file," then you're not logged in as an administrator.
You can then quit Terminal. Please note:
☞ Steps 1 and 2 are all copy-and-paste — type only your login password when prompted.
☞ When you type your password, you won't see what you're typing.
☞ If you don’t have a password, set one before taking Step 2. If that’s not possible, skip the step.
☞ Step 2 might not produce any output, in which case the Clipboard will be empty. Step 1 will always produce something.
☞ The commands don't change anything, and merely running them will do neither good nor harm.
☞ Remember to post the output. It's already in the Clipboard. You don't have to copy it. Just paste into a reply
☞ If any personal information, such as your name or email address, appears in the output of either command, anonymize it before posting. Usually that won't be necessary.
☞ Don't post the contents of the Terminal window.
☞ Don't paste the output of Step 1 into the Terminal window. Paste it into a reply. -
Due to divorce, all my music is on my iTunes and iPod. I have had to buy a new laptop and want to transfer the library to the new computer before deauthorizing the old one. I dont want to have to use an external drive every time I want to listen to my music. How can I do this and have the same basic iTunes setup as before? HELP!
You might consider itunes match for moving CDs you've copied into your itunes library if you dont have a way to use home sharing.
iTunes match is an optional service offered by apple that costs about $25 a year. It scans your music library and if it finds music that is already in apple's itunes catalog it'll automatically "unlock"/"store" these in the cloud for you. Items that it does not find in the catalog it'll upload and store these in the cloud for you and you can download them on your devices. See http://www.apple.com/itunes/itunes-match/ -
How to move Downloads, Movies, Music& Pictures folders to an external drive
I have a 2008 iMac which hard disk (as you probably know) is not upgradable. After 16 months of use the disk became full so I bought an external firewire drive (1T LaCie d2). My plan is to move most folders located under /Users/username/ (the Documents, Downloads, Movies, Music and Pictures folders) to the external drive and replace them with aliases.
Searching on the net, I found instructions on how to move the iTunes Music folder and how to change iPhoto default photos folder. I then moved the said folders and their contents to the external drive and created the aliases. Now when I try to delete the folders for their original location I get a message stating that "folders cannot be modified or deleted because they are required by Mac OS X". I know that I can delete these folders using terminal Unix commands but is this the correct approach?
Or should I go and create a new user account using as Home directory a folder located on the external drive? Or, alternatively, just change the existing user Home to one in the external drive?
I think my question is important and of general interest and I was really disappointed to find out that Apple has no documentation on this subject (or at least, I couldn't find any).Lefteris59 wrote:
I have a 2008 iMac which hard disk (as you probably know) is not upgradable. After 16 months of use the disk became full so I bought an external firewire drive (1T LaCie d2). My plan is to move most folders located under /Users/username/ (the Documents, Downloads, Movies, Music and Pictures folders) to the external drive and replace them with aliases.
Searching on the net, I found instructions on how to move the iTunes Music folder and how to change iPhoto default photos folder. I then moved the said folders and their contents to the external drive and created the aliases. Now when I try to delete the folders for their original location I get a message stating that "folders cannot be modified or deleted because they are required by Mac OS X".
this happens because they are protected by "deny delete" ACLs.
I know that I can delete these folders using terminal Unix commands but is this the correct approach?
that's one way to do it. then you can move the folders to teh external and put symbolic links, *NOT aliases* in their original locations.
Or should I go and create a new user account using as Home directory a folder located on the external drive?
Or, alternatively, just change the existing user Home to one in the external drive?
that might be the easiest option. just copy the whole home folder to the external. then go to system preferences->accounts. unlock the lock at the bottom, control-click on your user and choose 'advanced options". in the popup change the location of the home directory to the external. then reboot and when you log in your home directory should be on the external. then you can trash the old home directory on the internal.
I think my question is important and of general interest and I was really disappointed to find out that Apple has no documentation on this subject (or at least, I couldn't find any). -
Windows 8: Bit Locker encrypted drive "Access Denied" external drive
I rebuilt my computer and installed win 8.1 pro. Now my external drive comes up as an empty drive with "Access denied". Here is the kicker: I had turned off bitlocker on the external drive long ago as it interfered with automated backups.
Running the commands suggested here:
https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/windows/en-US/738c1760-c96d-430f-9ae6-1f28f5c60998/windows-8-bit-locker-encrypted-drive-not-found-or-access-denied?forum=w8itprosecurity it shows the bitlocker but as unlocked. Drive still shows empty.
Any suggestions?
Thanks,
MarkusAhh, turns out to be permission issue not bitlocker (or maybe bitlocker caused it to lose permissions, don't know).
Opened MyPc, right click on drive ->properties->security->advanced and selected apply to all.
Markus -
External drive encryption lockout
Hi,
I am running time machine on an encrypted external drive. Usually I have to log into the drive with a password upon connecting it. The problem I experienced is that drive locked me out and would freeze upon entering my password. I tried repairing drive with disk utility to no avail, the problem occured for about 24 hours. I read numerous forum entries about this problem where there seemed to be no definitive answer. A lot of ppl had given up and reformatted there drives.
When I tired diskutil cs list the drive I was getting,
CoreStorage logical volume groups (1 found)
|
+-- Logical Volume Group ***
=========================================================
Name: Big Kitty
Status: Online
Size: 2000052772864 B (2.0 TB)
Free Space: 0 B (0 B)
|
+-< Physical Volume ***
| ----------------------------------------------------
| Index: 0
| Disk: disk1s2
| Status: Online
| Size: 2000052772864 B (2.0 TB)
|
+-> Logical Volume Family ***
Encryption Status: Locked
Encryption Type: AES-XTS
Conversion Status: Complete
Conversion Direction: -none-
Has Encrypted Extents: Yes
Fully Secure: Yes
Passphrase Required: Yes
|
+-> Logical Volume ***
Disk: -none-
Status: Locked
Size (Total): 1999733997568 B (2.0 TB)
Conversion Progress: -none-
Revertible: No
LV Name: Big Kitty
Content Hint: Apple_HFS
Magically today my drive started working again so I just wanted to know if anyone has experienced this problem and if so was it related to the HD failing or an OS/X problem.
When I run diskutil cs list after it is working again I get;
CoreStorage logical volume groups (1 found)
|
+-- Logical Volume Group ***
=========================================================
Name: Big Kitty
Status: Online
Size: 2000052772864 B (2.0 TB)
Free Space: 0 B (0 B)
|
+-< Physical Volume ***
| ----------------------------------------------------
| Index: 0
| Disk: disk1s2
| Status: Online
| Size: 2000052772864 B (2.0 TB)
|
+-> Logical Volume Family ***
Encryption Status: Unlocked
Encryption Type: AES-XTS
Conversion Status: Complete
Conversion Direction: -none-
Has Encrypted Extents: Yes
Fully Secure: Yes
Passphrase Required: Yes
|
+-> Logical Volume ***
Disk: disk2
Status: Online
Size (Total): 1999733997568 B (2.0 TB)
Size (Converted): -none-
Revertible: No
LV Name: Big Kitty
Volume Name: Big Kitty
Content Hint: Apple_HFS
The difference you'll notice is the Disk is now disk2, and there is a volume name.
Thanks MattLaunch the Console application in any of the following ways:
☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)
☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.
☞ Open LaunchPad. Click Utilities, then Console in the page that opens.
Make sure the title of the Console window is All Messages. If it isn't, select All Messages from the SYSTEM LOG QUERIES menu on the left.
Click the Clear Display icon in the toolbar. Try the action that you're having trouble with again. Post any messages that appear in the Console window – the text, please, not a screenshot.
Important: Some private information, such as your name, may appear in the log. Edit it out by search-and-replace in a text editor before posting. -
Library locked on external drive
Hi,
I was using the Aperture on a PowerBook 17" laptop without problems. I was running out of space and copied the aperture library file on an external USB drive. It worked fine for a couple of weeks but than, after one import from my D200 stoped in the middle of transfering files, I received the message that the database is "locked". I looked at the file with the command-I key and the "locked" box is not checked and I do have read and write permision on the file. I copied the file back to the internmal HD (it takes forever for this 44GB file) and ran the disk verification and permisions on it: all fine with no errors given. I can read this file on the internal drive with no problems. I subsequently tried to copy this file on 3 other external disk drives and they all give me the errer message that the file is "locked". I am really at a loss: the Aperture library file can be read without problems on the internal drive but not external drives. I used the vault feature being afraid I will loose a few thousand picutures. I gave me some errors re. few projects: it could not back them up. This was not a problem before. I called Aperture Apple support and they were not very helpfull: they informed me that they had this problem "rarely". The fellow provinding customer support instructed me to delete the preference file in the "Preferences" folder pertaining to Aperture, create a new Aperture file to see if all works well (which it did) but did not solve my problem of "unlocking" the database on external drive where I would like to work with it since I am out of space on my laptop.
Did any of you had this problem? This could be a major shortcomming for this program if it locks your DB and can't unclock it. I should also mention that when I click the "loced" tab on the information pannel, the tick mark flashes but nothing happens.
Any help that will result in solving this problem will be appreciated.
CoolMac.
iMac17 and Powerbook G4 Mac OS X (10.4.1)Bear in mind that Time Machine will apply ACL's (extended permissions) to the backup disk so it may be completely normal to be unable to access files on that disk. If you are trying to use an iPhoto library inside the backups folder it may not work at all - it must be copied off to another disk to use with iPhoto.
With that said, if the disk is failing or damaged it may not mount in Finder - is that what is happening here?
It is also possible that the failure is the 'external case' and not the actual disk, if the controller is not working the disk may not mount - sometimes you can get a disk to work by using a different external case or a USB toaster
You will need to consider data recovery if the disk is on it's last legs or is corrupted. Frankly this is complex & you should send it to data recovery professionals if you are inexperienced - it is the best way to stand any chance of recovering data on a failing drive, but it is costly. You are also correct to se the disk as little as possible - if the damage is a mechanical issue reading the disk can cause the disk to fail quicker.
If you are intent on doing data recovery yourself you must get another disk that is larger than the disk you need to repair. Then you can use tools like Disk Warrior or or Disk Drill to repair the disk or recover the files.
Provide more info about where the library is & the state of the disk, you may not need to do recovery. -
Reset Time Machine Password to Backup Using External Drive
I have been using Time Machine to backup my files regularly on an External drive. I usually backup my files (using Backup Now option) and then turn off Time Machine. I have been doing this successfully for a month on my new MacBookPro (late 2013 version, purchased 5 March 2014). I used this same procedure successfully since 2010 on a previous Macbook Pro I owned.
I just tried to backup my files, all of a sudden Time Machine now asks me for a password which I don't remember setting. Time Machine Preferences looks like this.
When I try to set Time Machine On I cannot do it (I used to be able to do it). When I click unlock and try to input my MacbookPro login username and password, but this login/password is not accepted.
Frankly, I have no idea what happened. I must have pushed the wrong button at some point. I don't mind losing my old backus and resetting the password on Time Machine software, provided I can and backup my files right away.
How can I reset the Time Machine password? Any help will be much appreciated.
FranciscoDear Eric,
I am using a Western Digital Ultra external drive that I myself formatted Journaled. It is not encrypted.
I went to the keychain and I could not find the password for Time Machine. (Frankly, I am not sure where to look).
I also ran Keychain first aid and no problem was found. I also ran Keychain first aid repair and everything seems fine.
Tomorrow Monday I will call the repair shop, as I suspect they introduced a different password.
Many thanks for now. I will keep you posted.
Francisco -
Unable to change permissions on external drive.
I have an external Firewire drive attached to my PowerMac G5 running 10.5.5. Until the past few days I have been easily accessing (reading and writing) all areas of this drive from my standard non-admin user account since I have the "Ignore ownership on this volume" box checked in the get-info dialogue.
Recently however I have been unable to write to this drive from my non-admin account. When I go to the get-info dialogue, the "Ignore ownership on this volume" box is still checked but that doesn't seem to matter.
I am unable to click on the little padlock icon to change any permissions for any file on this partition (the other partition of this drive is being used by Time Machine, and does not seem to have the "Ignore ownership on this volume" box, and I am able to click on the padlock to make changes).
Any idea what is going on?I am having a similar problem, but I cannot unlock the drive - as there is no lock icon .The drive is one I bought at Best Buy, and is formatted FAT32. I cannot see anywhere to unlock the drive since I moved to SL. It worked fine before I did the conversion. My other drives (I have 5 total) allow me to read and write, but the problem drive is set to read-only. Any suggestions? The specifics in info are: Kind: Volume, Modified: Yesterday..., Format: MS_DOS (FAT32), Capacity: 319.99 GB, Available: 106.48 GB, etc... Shared Folder is unchecked. Sharing and Permissions says "You can only read"
Thanks for the help! -
HOTSYNC WITH PALM DESKTOP LOCATED ON AN EXTERNAL DRIVE
I've been hotsynching between my desktop, laptop and Z22. Recently I replaced the desktop harddrive with a much larger one. I put the old harddrive in a USB external drive housing and now have a nifty 40 GB external drive. Does anyone know how I can hotsync the Z22 one last time with the Palm Desktop info on the external drive? Then I'll install Palm Desktop on the new harddrive in my desktop, and hotsync from the Z22 to the new harddrive.
Post relates to: Palm Z22Is all your current data on the Z22? If it is, install Palm desktop on the new hard drive and sync the Z22 with desktop overwrites handheld selected in hotsync manager.
Another option is to install the version of Palm Desktop that you were using on the old hard drive, copy the username folder on the old hard drive in the Palm folder, Paste the username folder into the Palm folder on the new hard drive. Open Palm desktop and the data should be there.
For reference purposes, click on the following link for the support page for your device on the kb.palm.com webpage.
http://kb.palm.com/SRVS/NUA/launchTab.asp?t=home&fn=zire&mn=z22&cn=unlocked
There are links on the page to the user guide, troubleshooting, how to's, downloads, etc.
Post relates to: Palm i705
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