USB or Firewire external for back-up

I recently purchased a MacBook 2.16 Core 2 Duo with a 120GB hard drive running OS 10.5. I would like to get an external hard drive to back up the internal drive. I know I can boot from an external Firewire drive. Can I boot the computer from an external USB drive? If so, can I boot from a USB powered drive or would I need a seperate power source?

Yes you can boot from an external usb drive. I have Tiger still on my external. The drive you choose will decide if it has to be powered externally or not.

Similar Messages

  • USB or Firewire Interface for Logic

    Hi,
    I have a new iMac 20" dual core and am after a new audio interface to use with logic pro. Which would be the best to use with the iMac USB or Firewire?? I heard that the firewire ports are shared or something and I already have an external drive in one of the firewire ports so I was after some advice.
    Many thanks

    What you've probably heard is that the firewire bus is shared, not the actual port. All firewire ports on all Macs share the same bus. What this means is that if you are running a FW800 device and a FW400 device, the entire bus will only be running at 400.
    I'd personally recommend going firewire. You can always daisy-chain your devices and the firewire connection is better suited for audio in terms of consistent speed.
    There are plenty of posts throughout the board that talk about which ones are the most recommended. A simple search should yield an abundance of information on which interfaces are the best suited for what you want to do.

  • Is there usb to firewire adaptor for macbook air

    I have macbook air and want to connect my lacie drive via firewire but dont have a firewire port.  can you connect via a usb to firewire adaptor?

    Going down such as Thunderbolt to Firewire might be an option, but best bet for that is probably going to be Apple...Thunderbolt is an Apple invention.
    Sonnett makes really great products, I put one of their G4 processor cards, when you could still do that, into my PPC Mac and changed it from a 604e processor to a G4.  Worked flawlessly.  Their products are very likely to do exactly as advertised.
    Speed of connection goes: USB, Firewire 400, Firewire 800, Thunderbolt.  Unfortunately there are not very many Thunderbolt drives on the market at this point.  Too new technology.

  • USB and Firewire Card for Mac Pro 3.0

    I am running out of USB and Firewire Ports. Any suggestions on expansion cards for Firewire and USB??
    Thanks
    John

    The Sonnet PCI USB Express cards have this problem too - for the record. Sonnet know about the MacPro not waking with it installed, as do Apple. I am sure Apple willl come up with something, I may even find a workaround, but it has always seemed that expansion cards with all my Macs [ waaaay too many] have produced unpredicatable problems.

  • USB to Firewire Adapter for camcorder?

    Can I use a "USB to Firewire adapter" to import footage from a USB ported Mini DV camcorder?

    You'll find one for shure<<</div>
    Don't they make microphones and other audio products?
    -DH
    http://www.shure.com/index.htm

  • Is the USB going to be as fast as FireWire was for backing up?

    Totally in shock (as was the top salesman at the Fort Worth Apple Store) that there is NO FIREWIRE on the NEW MacBook. (They kept looking - didn't believe it. One guy said he would now NOT purchase a new MacBook and he is a top Apple sales pro at the store!!)
    How about backing-up? With a LaCie FW800/400 and USB External HD, I believe backing-up a 250 gb internal via USB will take 7+ hours the first time, vs about 3-4 hours with FireWire - using SuperDuper! for example--- RIGHT?
    I just don't understand this. Is there any cable, any external box or anything that one can purchase to rectify this situation? Is FW such an expensive, space-hording extra that it needed to be removed?
    My MacBook purchase (money in hand) is now indefinitely ON HOLD until I get this resolved...
    Thanks for any comments,
    Steve
    Wednesday 15 October 2008

    Many users in other threads have reported that backup programs like SuperDuper are an order of magnitude slower on USB 2 than on either FW400 or 800. I think they are exaggerating, but USB 2 bus negotiation is handled by the computer, not by the interface, so it takes more CPU; also, large files which might be able to stream on FW will not be able to on USB 2; so if you put video files on a USB 2 drive, there is a reasonable chance that you'll get dropouts on playback.
    Note also, that there is no tape based video camera (DV, HDV, or DVCPRO) which can transfer video over USB 2: the asynchronous nature of it's bus mastering will cause dropouts. There is not the possibility (from an engineering standpoint) of a USB to FW adapter of any sort.
    If you need firewire, and most audio / video users do because we have extant equipment investments, keep your old Mac, buy a iMac, or a MBP or MacPro where firewire exists.
    And send feed back to apple asking them to include FW on future MB's, either as a direct port, or at least include an ExpressBus card slot like the MBP.
    There will probably be future developments in Gigabit ethernet which may provide a new interface for synchronous transfers; encoding technology may improve so that avchd becomes equal to at least HDV in video performance (too many motion artifacts for serious videography). All of the M2T devices (hard drives which store HDV equivalent video files) are ... FIREWIRE drives.
    This will all sort itself out eventually. I just hope it is not a signal that Firewire is dead. At least a migration path needs to be available; and it is for MacPros and MBP since they have card slots. MB does not, and if FW disappears from a future iMac, there are no slots there, either.
    Eddie O

  • USB to Firewire adapter for MacBook Air?

    I would like to switch to a MacBook Air, but I still need to use my video camera via firewire. I found out that there is no direct way to connect firewire to MacBook Air, isn't it?
    Then I have found PCMCIA cards supporting firewire connections. The remain question now is: Does a PCMCIA drive with USB connector exist where I can plug in the PCMCIA firewire card? It seems that such a kind of combination works for UMTS PCMCIA cards. But does it work also for firewire cards? Which adapter could work?
    Or is there any other way to get my camera working at MacBook Air?

    Hi Michael,
    I am facing the same difficulty.. would like to plug my camcorder on my mac book air..
    but without firewire... do not know how to proceed.. which is very annoying..
    I ll get back to you if I come across some useful info
    By for now

  • User friendly usb or firewire interface for new garageband user

    Hi, newbie here: sorry if this is redundant, but in my case i just ordered an imac 17" with lots of speed and i want to know what are easy but decent interface options that folks can use to record in Garageband.
    I assume the new computers come with Garageband3?
    I have a couple shure mics; 57 and 58, and some ukes with and without active pickups, and a p.a. system. I have a couple accoustic guitars too, and I do some vocals.
    I am new to GB so will be looking at the video tutorial for GB as well.
    Any recomendations for an easy but decent interface REALLY appreciated.
    imac duo    

    PreSonus' hardware is plug and play:
    http://www.bulletsandbones.com/GB/Interfaces.html

  • External Hard Drive Options for Back Up - USB 2.0 or FireWire

    Needing some advice on this one. Looking to purchase an external hard drive for back up through Time Machine - also running Win XP via Parallels. Should I go USB 2.0 or FireWire or have both options? Is there any difference in speed? I will be also using the external hard drive as needed for other manual back ups and data transfers eg movie projects. (and yes the Macbook has Firewire).
    Would appreciate some comment / recommendations.

    Hey Pluke and welcome to the forum -
    Firewire is faster overall for data transfers especially large or lengthy ones. With this in mind, I would use an external enclosure that has both Firewire and USB.
    I'm not sure if this was part of your question or not but I would not include your virtual machine (xp) in your Time Machine backup. The reason is it will fill up your backup drive quickly because your TM backup copies hourly every file that has changes made to it. Your VM file is both large (the size of the virtual drive) and has changes even if you just have it open and not really using it. You should include your VM file in your manual backup instead.
    -GDF

  • HT1478 How do I download my iTunes music library onto an external USB drive for back up purposes?

    I have an external USB drive plugge into my computer. I want to download my iTunes music library onto the USB drive for back up purposes.
    Can't find a method on the iTunes menu. Help.

    See here: iTunes: Back up your iTunes library by copying to an external hard drive
    B-rock

  • Firewire Hubs For Use With A New Firewire 800 External Drive

    I currently have 3 HD daisy chained to one of my Firewire ports. I have an older Firewire iPOD with a dock that is attached to the other Firewire Port.
    I need more storage capacity so I am planning to get 1 Tetra La Cie - this model. I have had excellent experiences with LaCie.
    (LaCie 301442U d2 Quadra Hard Disk 1TB eSATA/FireWire800/FireWire400/USB 2.0 External Hard Drive (Aluminum).
    I would be using the new HD as a Time Machine Device and possibly as backup for my music library which is currently on one of the external HD's and backed up to a second HD.
    I don't have available ports.
    Are there Firewire Ports which would be functional?
    Should I be considering some other sort of configuration?
    This is an iMAC 24" bought in October 2006
    Thanks

    My music library is housed on an external hard drive so Time Machine can't be used since it requires an operating system on the source files...
    That's not true. You can back up files and folders on an external drive using Time Machine, as long as they are not on the same volume as the Time Machine archive. You just go to System Preferences +Time Machine+ pane. Click on the Options button. All external drives are on the +Do not back up+ list by default. Remove the external drive (with your iTunes files) from this list of things excluded from backup.
    If don't want to include everything on that external drive, put the folders you do not want backed up on the +Do not back up+ list. What I've done for my external FireWire drive (which is my primary data storage volume since my internal is only 160GB) is create two main folders. They are called Documents and +Documents (not backed up)+. They serve as an extension of the user account folder on the internal drive. Files and folders I want backed up go into Documents. Files and folders that are non-critical go into +Documents (not backed up)+. So then, the external drive volume gets removed from the +Do not back up+ list, so that Time Machine backs it up. But I put the +Documents (not backed up)+ folder back on the +Do not back up+ list so that only the Documents folder gets backed up.
    If you do daisy chain off the FireWire 800 port, be sure to put the 800 drive first on the chain. Putting the 400 drive before the 800 drive will reduce the speed to the 800 drive to 400 speed.
    perhaps the beach ball I often get when working with iTunes is a product of the speed of the data being accessed on the external hard drive.
    My +iTunes Music+ folder is on an FireWire 400 external drive. I do not notice any issues with iTunes accessing the files. That drive is attached directly to the iMac's port with no daisy-chaining behind it. If the free space gets low, the files and remaining free space will get more fragmented, and that can also cause such issues.

  • Use external drive for both Time Machine and storage for Back to My Mac

    Hi all,
    I have been "a Mac" now for over a year and just keep finding cool new things that make me happy I switched. The latest thing is Back to My Mac offered with my Mobile Me account. With a rather convoluted mix of PC/Mac/iOS devices to manage - best $99 I ever spent btw...
    I also have a 1TB Time Capsule that I have been using with Time Machine to back up all four of my Mac computers at home. Needless to say, the 1TB is really struggling to handle the amount of data being backed up and certainly leaves no room for anything else.
    What I wanted to do was to attach a larger external hard drive via a powered hub to the USB port on the Time Capsule and use it for Time Machine backups while using the internal 1TB drive with Back to My Mac so that I can have remote access to all my data from anywhere without having to leave my computer running at home all the time in order for my laptop to "see" it when I'm away. And, yes, the amount of that data far exceeds what any level of Mobile Me subscription can offer! I should also mention that the hard drive is the only USB device connected through the hub to the Time Capsule at the moment. There are no other devices that might be "getting in the way".
    I'm thinking maybe all this is asking too much without the addition of a dedicated file server (Mac Mini, perhaps - not a purchase my budget wants to make).
    I understand that the Time Capsule doesn't support partitions, so I bought a Western Digital 2TB Elements drive, connected it to my Macbook Pro and used Disk Utility to reformat the drive from the incompatible NTFS it shipped in to a single, Mac OS Extended (Journaled) partition. I then made two folders on the drive, one for Time Machine backups and one for Back to My Mac remote storage/access. Great.
    However, when I connected the 2TB drive to my Time Capsule I could not see it at all. Time Capsule was reporting problems in the way of a disk error. From within my Airport Utility, I could see the trouble was the external drive. The utility suggested connecting the drive to a Mac and using it's Disk Utility to troubleshoot.
    I followed through, checking the disk, etc. and ended up reformatted the drive on my Macbook Pro yet again with the same specifications as before but without the folders and reconnected it to the Time Capsule. Same deal. But now, I can't even remotely connect to the Time Capsule at all. I can see the Time Capsule in the shared area of my Macbook's Finder but can not connect. The connection tries and fails even before it gets to asking me for username and password credentials.
    Long story short, first of all, I suppose I would like to know if I'm asking for the impossible?
    Second, if what I want to do *is* possible, what steps do I need to take to make it so?
    Thanks in advance for any advice or suggestions you might have.

    Well, I have now reformatted/partitioned my poor WD Elements 2TB drive about a dozen times as well as restarted my 1TB Time Capsule so many times it's no wonder it's as confused as I am! <G>
    Last night, at your suggestion, William, and in respect for your continued support, I tried creating two 1TB Mac OS Extended (Journaled) partitions on the WD external USB drive, both with GUID partition tables. Both volumes mounted to my laptop's desktop flawlessly and without issue.
    Once the external drive was connected to the Time Capsule, however, it was a crap shoot as to whether or not the drive was recognized at all, reporting a problem with the disk, or, even at one point, mounting one of the two volumes but not both. <sigh>
    I read somewhere on the Internet that you need to restart the Time Capsule for volumes on an external USB drive to be recognized.
    So I tried that. I connected the freshly partitioned/formatted disk to the Time Capsule and restarted it. This succeed in removing the issue of reporting a nameless drive with a capacity of 0MB. It then reported the drive with its correct name but would not recognize whatever volumes in whatever partitions that particular crack at it contained with the exception of the once, as I mentioned above, when only one of two volumes mounted correctly and was listed with the right name and capacity on the Time Capusule's Setup's Disk tab.
    At this point I have given up on my goal to use the external drive with Time Machine to back up my Macs or to hope I will ever be able to see its contents remotely via Back to My Mac. All I would like to do now is simply find a reason why I can't get it successfully connected and playing nice with my Time Capsule in the first place!
    Any further suggestions or advice as to what steps I might take next would be greatly appreciated.
    Thank you all.

  • Using a firewire external drive for Raid

    Hi
    I posted a question related to this earlier but not specifially on this topic, hence this post.
    I was watching Lynda.com video tutorial for servers and noted how easy it seemed to set up a raid solution. However since I am going to use a mac mini for a server I cannot have two harddiscs in it. However I can have a firewire external disc as well as usb 2.0 discs. I figure usb is way to slow, but the firewire should be fast enough..so my question is..can I just buy a firewire disc connect it..use diskutility and set up a raid? Or is there something special I need to concern myself with here i.e special type of external disc etc?
    It would be supercool if I could do it this way. Might add, this is low traffic personal server and not a critical server at work..still would be nice with raid though. Then I would do time machine via the usb to an external disc.
    Cudos to everyone on the list for all your help.

    slightly better than a daisy chained raid array is a multiple bay external firewire enclosure that either offers hardware mirroring or can be mirrored in software. i've used these on client servers before, and they generally work fine.
    please be sure to consider the pros and cons of running a mini as a server 24/7, as the 2.5" internal drives aren't generally made to do such things. i usually discourage using minis as servers unless budget or other circumstances prohibit something better.

  • My mac Doesn't seem to see my external hard drive (seagate 1tb) I have it usb'd in to the back of my computer, but when I open time machine...it does not see it. Help

    My mac Doesn't seem to see my external hard drive (seagate 1tb) I have it usb'd in to the back of my computer, but when I open time machine...it does not see it. Help...please

    Yes...at least I thought it was....I have 10.6.8.
    That's the whole issue. I want to run/install photoshop elements but I have to have 10.8. for that. So...be fore I install an upgrade (Yosemite is getting BAD press) I thought I'd check my back up...it's not there...I have the seagate plugged in and the usb into the back of the mac...when I try to turn the time machine "ON" it says airport device not found not ....
    By the way...I REALLY appreciate the help here....

  • Keep getting a "the disk you inserted was not readable by this computer" when I insert my printer cord into either USB port.  Recently installed a portable hard drive for back up purposes.  Related?

    Keep getting a "the disk you inserted was not readable by this computer" when I insert my printer cord into either USB port.  Recently installed a portable hard drive for back up purposes.  Related?

    Does your printer have a slot for an SD card?  Is there are card in the slot?  If so, the computer is trying to mount that card as an external device.  It might be corrupted so that it can't be read.

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