Using external drive to run programs

I have just bought a 500Gb External Hard Drive for my MBP, which can be connected via USB, FW400 or FW800.
I was wondering if i were to install applications, games such as "Call Of Duty 2" or a program such as "Pro Tools" onto the external drive, would i be able to run them on my MBP from there, and if so, will it run slower than it would if it were installed on the internal HD?
Any help/advise would be great. Thanks

That other guy is right that it won't run any slower. I don't know about CoD2, but I've been meaning to try running it from an external HD.
As for Pro-Tools, you would be correct to run it from the external drive for two reasons:
a) the ability to take your session to a different pro-tools rig (duh)
b) Pro Tools, depending on your computer's particular specifications, will either barely run or not run at all from a record drive (in this case, your external 7200rpm drive) under 7200rpm. To be honest, I would highly recommend upgrading to a 10,000-15,000 rpm drive. 7200 will work, but you might have problems when recording 24-bit audio (don't use 16-bit, its garbage). As long as the rest of your comp is up to par, you shouldn't have any real problems though.
email me if you have any other pro-tools or CoD2 (mac version) questions. I'm currently in the process of getting my Pro-Tools Operator's Certification, so I could use the practise:)
[email protected]

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HD failed on iMac 7.1. How do I use external drive to run computer?

I have an iMac made in mid 2007. It is an Intel Duo Core processor. The hard drive has failed. Apple says I can use an external drive to run it. I have a installation disk for Snow Leopard. How can I install Snow Leopard onto the external disk given that the computer is unusable?

If no way to have an internal hard drive installed into your iMac, then you will need to purchase two good quality, large capacity FireWire 800 (fast data transfer connection) external hard drives.
FIreWire 800 drives will give you an operational speed close to the same speed as your iMac's internal hard drive.
One external hard drive will be used as your iMac's main working drive. The other drive is to be used to create either cloned, bootable backup drive or to be used with OS X Time Machine backup app.
To install OS X Snow Leopard onto an external hard drive, if your iMac's optical drive is still working, power up your iMac holding down the C key on the keyboard and immediately insert the install disc into the optical drive slot on the side of your iMac.
Your iMac should boot up to the system that is on the install disc.
Once you are in the Installer app, go up to the main menu bar and quit the installer.
Then on the main menu bar launch the Disk Utility app and format the external drive for Mac OS X Extended ( journaled ) format with a GUID partition scheme.
You can decide if you want one larger partition on break the drive down into more than one partition for data storage purposes or not.
Once the drive is formatted, quit Disk Utility, relaunch the OS X installer app and proceed, following the instructions to install OS X Snow Leopard onto your external drive.
Once installed, you'll be prompted to restart your iMac and it should automatically find where OS X is installed and boot up your Mac to OS X.
From there, you can go into OS X Preferences Panel and select the software update feature of OS X to update your OS X version to OS X 10.6.8 and all of your Apple installed apps.
In OS X System Prefrences panel under Startup disc icon, click the icon and set the startup disc for the external hard drive that shows your currently installed OS X system.
This OS X will know where OS X is always launched from and won't have to hunt for it when you always startup your Mac.
You will have to reinstall all your third party applications, too.
Good Luck!

How can I boot my (OS Lion) Macbook (using external drive) to run Leopard

   I have recently installed Lion on my macbook. Previously, I had Snow Leopard. During that time, I used an external hard drive to boot into Leopard to run some programs that didn't run on SL (Spring Cleaning, for example).
   Today is the first time I tried to boot from the hard drive with Leopard on it since upgrading to Lion. Hitting Option during startup doesn't even show the external drive, and using the System Preferences/ Startup Disk method is equally useless.
   I like Lion and don't feel like doing a total re-install just to have occasional access to an older OS, but I'd sure like to have it all!
Any ideas for a workaround?

Verify that your external drive was formatted as GUID, it won't be bootable otherwise.

Can we use external drive with ipad air

can we use external drive with ipad air?

There are some wifi-enabled drives that allow you to stream content (music, films, tv programmes) to an iPad, but you can't directly connect one to an iPad.

Is there a way to install Windows (with programs) on an external drive and run it from the Pro?

I have a 1TB Seagate Goflex that I am using to backup the Mac, but I want to partition it and run Windows and Windows Apps from it, rather than risk my HDD. Does anyone have any experience doing that or have any ideas on how it might be done? I am willing to risk the Seagate external drive, but not the laptop.

Bob,
you could put a virtualizer such as VirtualBox or Parallels Desktop on the external drive, and install Windows and Windows apps in the virtualizer.

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.

Can't switch iPhoto Libraries to use external drive

I'm using iPhoto 4.0.3 on an old iBook G3, and I keep my photos on an external drive, but right now I can't access it, because my computer seems to have created its own imaginary version of the external drive, which I can't access. (I'll explain it better below.)
In other words, if I open iPhoto, there are photos there (165 of them, all fairly recent), but if I try to find an iPhoto Library on my hard drive, or any record of the photos in it, I come up empty. I must have accidentally imported photos when my external drive wasn't connected, but now I can't figure out where my computer actually put those photos, so that I can delete that iPhoto Library and go back to using the iPhoto Library on my external drive.
Here's what I've found so far:
If I open Finder and search for iPhoto, there is no iPhoto Library.
If I search for the name of one of the photos that's displayed in iPhoto, I get 0 results.
If I search for all files with the .jpg extension, none of the photos that's showing in iPhoto shows up.
If I create an album and put some photos in it, and then search for that album name, I get 0 results.
BUT, if I try to EXPORT a photo from iPhoto, I get some clue to where these photos are hiding - the default location to export photos to is XXX's Computer/Macintosh HD/Volumes/FANTOM/Pictures/iPhoto Library. That's the location of the iPhoto Library on my external drive.
Also, based on an answer to another forum question, I opened Libraries/Preferences/com.apple.iPhoto.plist in Text Edit and searched for key>RootDirectory, and the directory it gives there is /Volumes/FANTOM/Pictures/iPhoto Library. The only problem is, I've disconnected my external drive and restarted my computer, and iPhoto is still displaying 165 pictures in my photo library.
So it seems like my computer THINKS it's looking on my external drive, but actually it's looking at some 'volume' that's on the hard drive - and even when the external drive is connected, the only photos it shows are the ones in this volume, not the ones in my actual iPhoto Library. I want to be able to switch to my normal photo library, but the only way I can do that is if I figure out where this mystery photo library is located, and rename it. Does anybody know how to do this?
Thanks for your help.
iBook G3 Mac OS X (10.3.9)

You don't say whether you've restricted your search, or where you are searching. If you haven't renamed your iPhoto Library folder and it doesn't show up in a search, then it isn't there.
I'm not clear on what you mean by "imaginary version of external drive". Disconnect the drive, and there should be very little left to it's imagination. If iPhoto launches, then it's not looking for the iPhoto Library folder on the external drive -- nothing imaginary.
The destination to which a photo is exported has nothing to do with where iPhoto might have its library (real, or imagined). An "exported" photo is, by definition, not a part of your iPhoto library -- all you're doing is drawing conclusions from unrelated information.
Quit iPhoto if it's running, disconnect your external drive, and delete the "com.apple.iPhoto.plist" file from your user's Library >Preferences folder. If iPhoto starts without any unusual prompts, then it is (and likely, has been all along) using the iPhoto Library folder from your start-up drive's Pictures folder.

Using external drive for itunes

Hope someone can help with this: I am going travelling and want to take my music library, at present in itunes on my desktop G4. I have copied this library onto a 100GB portable hard drive, and would now like to get itunes on my macbook to refer to this library on my hard drive. I tried going to preferences and changing the itunes music folder location to
Lacie Drive:music:itunes:itunes music:
but after I okay this, nothing happens, the itunes on my macbook is still full of the few songs I have put there, and no sign of the 2.99GB of music that I copied off the G4.
Ideally I want to keep the hard drive of the macbook as empty as possible, so would like to use itunes just from the external drive, plugging it in whenever I want to use itunes.
Many thanks,
Hugh
G5, macbook pro, G4 Mac OS X (10.4.7)

By changing the location, you only told iTunes where to store the next ripped CD or purchased music. iTunes doesn't know where your music is.
The song locations are stored in the 'iTunes Library' file.
If you're using iTunes 7, there could be an easy fix.
First, copy the entire iTunes folder from the G4 to the external drive (not just the iTunes Music folder inside it).
Then connect the drive to the MacBook and hold the Option button down when you run iTunes. Keep holding it down until a window pops up that lets you choose a library (or create a new one).
Choose the iTunes folder on the external.
iTunes now should recognize it.
Hope this helps.
M

Can I install Leopard on an external drive to run my computer?

Since it seems my hard drive has totally bit the dust, can I install Leopard on the external drive I use for Time Machine, and run my desktop from that drive? Could I run it from an external drive totally dedicated to Leopard? I am buying a new desktop soon, but I need info off of this machine. Can I plug in my Time Machine drive to my laptop and be able to use it without losing data?

Elizabeth Salcido wrote:
Thanks so much.
Youa re welcome!
I figured I would have to use a second drive. At least when I get my new desktop I will have a drive for Time Machine for both desktop and laptop.
If you really plan to keep the laptop around after you get your desktop, I would recommend replacing its internal hard drive. While running your laptop off an external is possible, it should be considered a stopgap measure. i wouldn't do it on a permanent basis. For one, as you'll find out, it's quite a bit slower than when using the internal drive.

Not enough space on my disk, want to change iphoto to use external drive

I dont have enough space on my hard disk. I want to use an external drive to put all my pictures. Is there a way I can configure iphoto to use my new drive instead of the current location. How can we do this and what will be the best way to move my existing library to the new drive.

1. First make sure iPhoto is not running. If it is, quit it. Use the Finder to copy your iPhoto Library file to your external drive. Unless you've changed it, its located inside your Pictures folder and is named "iPhoto Library".
2. After the copy is complete, start iPhoto while simultaneously holding down the option key. iPhoto will bring up a dialog box. The file in the list is your existing Library on your internal disk. Click the "Other Library" button and navigate to your external drive. Select your freshly copied iPhoto Library file and click "Open". iPhoto will from now on open and work with this library on the external drive.
3. After you've confirmed iPhoto is working properly with the newly copied library you may wish to delete the original library in your Pictures folder to recover the disk space.
Don't forget to keep a backup copy of your library on a separate disk. It's not a matter of "if" your external drive will fail but "when". You need to make regular backups or you'll be sorry someday.

Best strategy for using external drive to speed up painfully slow mac mini

I have Intel core duo, and LaCie external drive. Many programmes are almost unusably slow. Like Adobe Photoshop, Garageband, Logic Express, SecondLife etc... (would have been nice if apple had told me the 'improved spec' would mean so many programmes would no longer work!)
I am looking for the best way to utilise the external drive. I have now set up to boot from the LaCie, but it is no better. Id like to know whats best to do with the two drives. Would one be best kept as clear as possible? And should that be the bootup drive? Originally, the idea was to increase storage and backup. Now it is anything at all, that will make this computer faster. My old G4 PowerMac is actually faster and more reliable!
powerMac G4 Mac OS X (10.3.9)
powerMac G4 Mac OS X (10.3.9)
powerMac G4 Mac OS X (10.4.9)
powerMac G4 Mac OS X (10.3.9)
powerMac G4 Mac OS X (10.3.9)
powerMac G4 Mac OS X (10.4.9)

There is no way to improve on the graphics card in your mini - it's built into the logic board and can't be bypassed. However, while that may be a disappointment, it has to be said that by and large the graphics system in the mini is actually very capable, and is probably not the cause of the problem.
What IS the primary issue I suspect is the 512Mb RAM, which on a Core Solo running applications such as Photoshop is so woefully inadequate that it would be a surprise if your old G4 wasn't somewhat faster!
The problem is that Photoshop (the version you have) is not Intel-native, so while it runs, it requires Rosetta. Thus you have a RAM-hungry operating system, a RAM hungry application and a RAM-hungry translation package, all running at the same time. To add to that, since the software is not Intel-native, it has to be translated on-the-fly so considerable CPU time is needed to devote to that process in addition to all the other things the system needs to do in order to run.
Thus your external drive would not help much when used as a boot drive because even though it is likely to be somewhat faster than the internal, the limited RAM of the system will be forcing so many 'paging' actions (writing and reading memory blocks to the hard drive) that any speed gains will be rather heavily masked.
Most of the performance problems you experience can be resolved by upgrading RAM to 2Gb, simply because that will allow MacOS, Rosetta and your software a lot more room to breathe and significantly reduce the paging activity of the system such that then booting from the external will show notable improvements in responsiveness.
Alternatively, you may find that there are Intel-native alternatives to your software which may be available at reasonable cost and provide the features you need. Good examples are such things as GraphicConverter, which is shareware and does much of what Photoshop can do, and NeoOffice, which is open source and free, which is a good alternative to MS Office. These would run without Rosetta and provide you with much improved performance as a consequence.

Can I get more speed by using external drive?

Hi All,
I have a very old iMac. Here are the specs:
Hardware Overview:
Model Name:          iMac
Model Identifier:          PowerMac6,3
Processor Name:          PowerPC G4 (3.3)
Processor Speed:          1.25 GHz
Number Of CPUs:          1
L2 Cache (per CPU):          256 KB
Memory:          1.25 GB
Bus Speed:          167 MHz
I think if I get an external drive and move all my document onto it I can speed the computer up. Is this a good strategy? What should I get that is reasonably affordable?

It is slow when navigating on iTunes or the web -- lots of spinning rainbows. I am using OSX10.5.8. I cannot increase memory anymore than I have. It's at 1.25 GB. I have used all bu 596 MB.
I'm not convinced adding memory will improve performance that much if you have 596mb free.
I'd try a different web browser. I'd look at activity monitor & see if you can spot a hog.
TenFourFox -- It's a port of the latest FireFox to run on older hardware and software.
"World's most advanced web browser. Finely tuned for the Power PC."
    -- works for me on 10.4. Supports 10.5
http://www.floodgap.com/software/tenfourfox/
alternative download site:
http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/37761/tenfourfox
Turn on pipelining. This will allow Firefox to make simaltaneous requests to the server. Chrome has pipeling turned on. Some sites could fail to load with pipeling set on. The site will be old. See "Increase pipelining" in:
http://www.hongkiat.com/blog/firefox-optimization-tips/
OmniWeb uses the lastest Safari framework. The open source WebKit. Other browsers like Safari and iCab use the OS version of WebKit. The OmniWeb downloaded dmg includes it's own copy of the latest WebKit.
http://www.omnigroup.com/products/omniweb/
Safari 5.0.6 Leopard.
http://support.apple.com/kb/dl1422
Some semi-randomn thoughts on addressing performance problems.
Activity Monitor
Look at what is happening with your Mac when you run Activity Monitor.
Macintosh-HD -> Applications -> Utilities -> Activity Monitor
Click on the CPU tab on the lower half of the window. Make sure the little triangle is pointed down. Make the triangle point down by clicking.
With the down pointed triangle, you will see the apps which are using the most of the processor.
You can gain some understanding of Activity Monitor by looking at it every once in a while. Look at the small graph.
Here is how I have my cpu display set up:
AppleJack
"AppleJack is a user friendly troubleshooting assistant for Mac OS X. With AppleJack you can troubleshoot a computer even if you can't load the GUI, or don't have a startup CD handy. AppleJack runs in Single User Mode and is menu-based for ease of use."
http://applejack.sourceforge.net/
Console
You can use the console application to examine Mac OS log files. The logs will contain information on various system processes.
Macintosh-HD -> Applications -> Utilities -> Console
File > open console log
this will display the startup messages
and
file > open system log
once the system is started, messages will go into the system log
Other folks
bdaqua advises running disk utility from install disk and performing a safe boot:
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2256611&tstart=0
Allan Jones advises running automatic maintenance scripts and checking for free disk space:
http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=10845311#10845311
K Shaffer advises checking for available RAM and checking for free disk space:
http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=10879449#10879449

Old computer dying want to use external drive with new laptop ........... HOW ??

need to get laptop to run my iTunes library from old dying comp. Have a 500gb external drive but what do i do ??

okay, i had to collect my thoughts for a moment
... but I don't have an internal library of music on this machine.
is *this machine* the new Mac ?
How do I set up iTunes to play from an external library for the first time?
the files will have to be added to iTunes. however, with the correct settings, they can be put straight on the external.
in order to set up iTunes on the new Mac, you will have to launch it. with the external drive mounted on your new Mac's desktop, go iTunes > preferences > advanced and point +iTunes media folder location+ to the external. this will cause iTunes to put all newly added content in that location.
also on the advanced tab, check +keep iTunes media folder organized+ and +copy files to ... when adding to library+.
And how do I add my backed up music from my previous iTunes to that external drive's new music library?
did you back up the music to disk ? if so, you should probably authorize iTunes with your iTMS account details, then just pop in the disk(s) and add the content to your library.
if you have backed up to an external HD, use the +add to library+ command from the file menu and navigate to the folder containing your media files.
JGG
edited by the Jolly Green Giant (where Green stands for environmentally friendly)

Using External Procedure to run oracle6i reports

Can we run oracle server reports "rwrun60" through database external procedure?
A typical command is "/oracle/dev6i/bin/rwrun60 MODULE=/tmp/runrep017 P_1=671260 BATCH=YES USERID=<uid>/<pwd>@<sid> DESNAME=/tmp/runrep0171.lis DESTYPE=FILE DESFORMAT=dflt NONBLOCKSQL=NO".
When I tried it did not run report through external procedure, however a print command worked fine through external procedure.

That other guy is right that it won't run any slower. I don't know about CoD2, but I've been meaning to try running it from an external HD.
As for Pro-Tools, you would be correct to run it from the external drive for two reasons:
a) the ability to take your session to a different pro-tools rig (duh)
b) Pro Tools, depending on your computer's particular specifications, will either barely run or not run at all from a record drive (in this case, your external 7200rpm drive) under 7200rpm. To be honest, I would highly recommend upgrading to a 10,000-15,000 rpm drive. 7200 will work, but you might have problems when recording 24-bit audio (don't use 16-bit, its garbage). As long as the rest of your comp is up to par, you shouldn't have any real problems though.
email me if you have any other pro-tools or CoD2 (mac version) questions. I'm currently in the process of getting my Pro-Tools Operator's Certification, so I could use the practise:)
[email protected]

Can I install XP in a (partitioned) external drive and run it on my Macbook

I just bought a Macbook (late '08), but for work I need to use Windows XP. I have a 500 MB external drive, too.
Could I partition my external drive, install XP there and run it on my Macbook from there?
How would the external drive be affected as far as storing content from both OS's?
Thanks.

Hi Sergio,
Thanks. What if I partitioned my macbook's hard drive (I see everybody is talking of boot camp, but I haven't looked it up yet), say 70% mac and 30% xp, then I could run xp no problem, right?
Yes, that should work out. XP itself needs about 10GB of HD space to run perfectly and add to that the amount of space you need for your Windows applications.
BootCamp is part of OSX Leopard, see here: http://www.apple.com/support/bootcamp/
And could I save my content from both OS in the ext drive without distinction and be able to fish it out, or should I partition my drive too?
If 'save' = backup, then you can use WinClone http://twocanoes.com/winclone/ to make an image file of your Windows partition and for OSX backup you can use TimeMachine (part of OSX) or SuperDuper or Carbon Copy Cloner which can make a bootable backup of your OSX partition onto your external HD.
http://www.shirt-pocket.com/SuperDuper/SuperDuperDescription.html
http://www.bombich.com/software/ccc.html
If you simply want to save your files onto your external HD and have no single files that are bigger than 4GB you can make one partition on your external HD nd use the FAT32 file system (called MS-DOS in OSX Disk Utility).
Regards
Stefan

Using external drive to run programs

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