Using ipod as external drive

Notice by apple:
Do not format iPod to erase songs or playlists
Do not use a disk utility program, such as Disk Utility, Drive Setup, or Windows Explorer, to erase iPod. Erasing songs from iPod this way can disable its music playing capabilities and you may have to update or restore iPod to get it to work again.
Okay, So If I want to use the ipod as an external drive and I use explorer to copy files to ipod and erase the same way, there should be no problem right? I think what they are talking about is the actual files that are encoded that ipod copies and puts in organized directories...
Anyone tried coping exe files or other files using ipod as a hard drive? Why? I wanted to copy itunes to the ipod for when I travel to another location to just copy that program to the hard drive and install there to a computer w/o internet connnection...
  Windows XP Pro  

Put the iPod into Disk Mode and you can copy any files to the HD. Music files copied this way will not be able to be played on the iPod, though. Always transfer music via iTunes.
It will just take up space that could be used by music files (but that's pretty obvious).
You should have little problem doing what you propose.

Similar Messages

  • Using iPod as external drive on Time Capsule

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    Unfortunately, as you have discovered, an iPod won't work with the USB port on the Time Capsule. The controller inside will only recognize certain devices. See this KB articel for the uses of the USB ports on various Airport devices:
    http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2421
    Cheers!

  • I have an iPod G2 with a firewire 400 lead. how can I attach it to my new 13 inch Mac book Pro, is there a 400 to 800 firewire converter. USB lead wont work with the Macbook Pro. iPod used as an external drive to archive memory cards on the go.

    My G2 iPod that I use as an external drive to archive memory cards on the go cannot link with my new 13" Macbook Pro cause it uses a firewire 400 lead. It will not work with a USB lead. Is there a firewire 800 ipod lead or converter available? Can any one shed some light on this please?

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  • HT1329 Use of ipod as external drive, help!!!

    I got a new PC & used my ipod (after realising you could do this and there was space on my ipod) as a hard drive to transfer my itunes library to my new PC. It was far from straight-forward and I had to buy two lots of software to help me do this, as my library had loads of my own music in it (i.e. not just what was bought from itunes store). This seems to have worked now, and after almost 2 days of trying things out my itunes on my new PC is syncing with my ipod and transferred music library (I hope!). Only thing is, I now have half my ipod capacity as 'other' and I can't get rid of it! A third of it is, I think, my original files, and I have half of it as yellow 'other' (is this my library which I had backed up inot my ipod to use as an external drive to transfer??) and I want to delete it to get my space back, what can I do?

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  • Using only an External Drive

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  • Used ipod as a drive to copy songs into new itunes on new computer. Some songs do play in entirety, las minute cuts off with nothing plyaing, or it suddenly starts playing a different song. "TIme" shown is correct in the file.

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  • HT201250 Can I restore photo files from Time Machine without the use of an external drive?  I'm trying to restore lost photo files and I see them listed in Time Machine (without use of an external drive), but when I try to restore I get a error code 36.

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  • Using iPod as flash drive but deleted data space stays used up

    Using iPod as flash drive for files. When I'm finished with the files I deleted this data off the iPod but it is saying the memory is full.
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    Even though I searched beforehand, I was redirected to this link <https://discussions.apple.com/message/3490336#3490336> AFTER I posted it. So problem solved! Hurrah!

  • Can I use a 2tb external drive with Time Machine to backup my Mac Mini (256gbSSD + 2tbHDD)?

    Can I use a 2tb external drive with Time Machine to backup what I have on my Mac Mini?
    My Mac Mini has one 256 SSD and one 2tb HDD. I want to use Time Machine to do a backup of everything.
    Would an external 2tb My Passport Drive by Western Digital work for the backup?
    It seems like it would not work because the total storage on the Mac Mini is 2304 gigabytes (SSD + HDD).
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    No. A Time Machine backup drive should have at least twice the capacity of the drive it backs up. You would need at least a 4 TB backup drive for Time Machine.
    Might I suggest as an alternative that you not use Time Machine but a third-party backup utility that simply overwrites older files with new ones such that the backup drive can be the same capacity as the drive backed up.
    Suggested Backup Software
      1. Carbon Copy Cloner
      2. Get Backup
      3. Deja Vu
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  • I recently purchased a new iMac with an external drive.  I want to transfer my files from my old iMac to the external drive, but I'm afraid that doing that will compromise the use of the external drive on my new iMac.  Comments?  Help?

    I recently purchased a new iMac with an 1 Terrabyte external drive.  I want to transfer my files from my old iMac to the external drive, but I'm afraid that doing that will compromise the use of the external drive on my new iMac.  I have not downloaded the external drive's software onto my old Mac because of this concern.  May I simply "drag and drop" the contents I want transferred to the external drive, then set up my new Mac with the drive and download there? or is there a better procedure?  Comments?  Help?

    If your intention is to copy a just documents and data (word processing files and music for example) then yes, you can use drag and drop. If you want to transfer data and applications and permissions, it would actually be easiest to connect the drive to your old computer and turn on TimeMachine. Once TM is finished, connect the drive to your new computer and restart it holding the option key to get into Recovery mode. Then you can use the restore from TM option to transfer your data and programs to the new computer.

  • Why is my iTunes so slow when used on an external drive

    I have an late 2006 iMac Intel 2.0GHz w/ 512mb ram, Model MA200LL. It has a 250GB HD. 13.4GB of used space on the internal HD. The problem has occurred when it had Tiger and has persisted through Leopard 10.5.2.
    I have 125GB of music on a Seagate Free Agent 250GB external hard drive. When I try to delete a song it takes 87 seconds to delete. When I scroll through the 22,222 songs I get a spinning wheel for 10 - 15 seconds. Switching songs works very good.
    I used the same external drive on my Mac Pro (2.66GHz - 1GB Ram) and when I try the same actions it works instantly.
    The same issues arises when I used a 500GB WD World Book external hard drive.
    I have run Onyx which reported no problems with the internal hard drive.
    Should I expect to delete files quicker on the iMac in iTunes? If there is a problem, what can I do so that I get iTunes to perform better using an external drive?
    Thank you.

    One thing that you can do in general to help overall performance is upgrade your RAM. The late 2006 iMacs should be able to take up to 3GB of RAM(some people install 4GB anyway) but even going up to 2GB should help your system a lot. Besides RAM is cheap these days: http://eshop.macsales.com/MyOWC/Upgrades.cfm?model=288&type=Memory&TI=3454&shoup grds=Show+Upgrades
    The Free Agent drives are USB only so for one thing USB will be slower than your internal drive by at least half, however it still shouldn't take 10-15 seconds to access unless something else is going on. What version of iTunes do you have? Did you try Repairing the Disk Permissions and Verifying your internal drive? Try resetting the SMC and see if that helps: http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=303446
    Should I expect to delete files quicker on the iMac in iTunes? If there is a
    problem, what can I do so that I get iTunes to perform better using an external
    drive?
    Yes. The internal drive inside your iMac has read/write speeds somewhere between 55-65MB/sec while your USB will max out at about 30MB/sec. This may not fix your problem but just as recommendation, next time purchase an external drive that has a Firewire connection. Firewire 400 maxes out at about 40MB/sec but overall performance is usually better than USB 2.0.
    George

  • How do i use ipod as flash drive?

    I plugged my IPOD and opened iTunes. "Manually manage music and videos" is already checked, "Enable disk use" is also checked but greyed. However, IPOD does not appear in My Computer. I would uncheck "Manually manage music and videos" but if I do then I would lose most of my songs. How can I use my IPOD as flash drive?
    IPOD 30G    

    Have you had a chance to look at these troubleshooting pages? They may be of some help:
    iPod is not recognized properly by computer when USB drivers are not installed properly or are out of date
    Microsoft Support - A computer that is running Windows XP cannot detect a USB thumb drive, an Apple iPod, or an external hard disk drive

  • Using iPod as external file source for iTunes

    I have a laptop and a HUGE iTunes library which is stored on an external HDD.
    I'm taking the laptop on vacation (and not the external drive) which means that I won't have an iTunes library while on the trip.
    I don't want to transfer GB of audio files onto my laptop HDD just for a trip but I would like to use iTunes.
    I wonder if I can -
    1a. Set my iPod to act as a portable drive (I forget what this setting is called)
    1b. Mount my iPod as an external drive
    2. Create a new iTunes library on the laptop HDD
    3. Set the preferences to import songs data but to leave the files where they are (I forget what this setting is called exactly).
    4. Import files found on the iPod external drive.
    I realize that iTunes would only be able to play music when the the ipod was mounted as a HDD.
    Does that sound like it would work? Is there anything I'm forgetting?
    Thanks.

    You don't have to do any of that. Is your iPod large enough to hold your entire library? If so, all you have to do is set your iPod to MANUAL manage. Under manual manage, you can now hook the iPod up to ANY computer running iTunes and play the stuff directly from the iPod in iTunes.
    To be safe, you still may want to start a new library on your laptop and just leave it empty. Then you can switch to that library when on vacation, play anything you want out of the iPod and not have to worry about accidentally messing something up with your normal library if/when it tried to access stuff from the external drive that is not with you.
    When you get home, switch back to your normal library and change the iPod back to Auto update. Nice thing about this is when you change back to auto, your iPod will sync back to your original library and all the updates like ratings, play counts, last date played, etc. will sync back.
    You can test it out right now. Just change your iPod to manual manage, APPLY, then go ahead and play right out of the iPod in iTunes.
    Cheers,
    Patrick

  • Use of an external drive for itunes library - backup options?

    Hi,
    I have a dell laptop with 60GB of memory and I just purchased an 80GB ipod classic. I cannot upgrade the storage in this laptop. Originally I was thinking I would just buy a new laptop. But given that all laptops now come with Windows Vista and reading about all the issues that users have had with Vista and Itunes I do not think that would be a good idea. Do you agree that I should just stick with my Windows XP Machine?
    So I was thinking I would change my music library so it resides on an external drive. My only concern with this - is how do I keep a backup of this external drive? From reading all the forum posts if this external drive failed it can be done moving the information from an ipod back to another drive using third party software but it sounds risky.
    Any thoughts on how others are handling this would be appreciated.
    Thank you!
    Karen

    Karen, most 3rd party software is pretty easy to use. The one thing I need to point out that relying on the iPod can be pretty risky, too. What if iPod is lost or stolen? What if you have an iPod problem that requires a restore? I would suggest that as a secondary backup for the EHD, you either burn data discs or possibly consider a 2nd EHD, since you can buy them pretty cheap these days. Right now, I backup to 2 different EHD's, then burn data discs as needed of my iTunes library, just in case I would be unlucky enough to lose everything.

  • How to download from iPod an external drive to my computer.

    I would like to download albums from my iPod back to my computer. I deleted a number of albums from my computer by error. They are in the iPod. Can I do this?

    drag the "iPhoto Library" to the external drive - by default your iPhoto library is in the pictures folder  --  the only thing you do with the iPhoto application is to "depress the option key and launch iPhoto then use the "select library" option to point to the new location on the external drive "
    courtesy Larrry
    No, unless its time machine, anything do on your Mac is not mirrored in your external HD.
    yes, after copied, it will be on your computer to do with as you like.

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