Post number 7 in this thread will be of interest. Perhaps the problem is OS-related, triggered somehow by the update you did, and is not a problem with the drive itself. If the problem does end up appearing to be drive-related, as indicated by the presence of similar symptoms when it is connected to different computers, if the drive is formatted in FAT32 and Toby's good suggestion does not resolve the problem you could try connecting it to a Windows computer and running the Chkdsk utility. Post back if you'd like further information about that, indicating which Windows OS is being used. I have found Chkdsk to be very effective in repairing corrupted disk file systems, which may be what is causing the problem. Regards, -- Al |
I was originally unable to find the disc in finder. I did all the things you mentioned. When i checked the box on usb in finder, i was then able to see the hard drive. { i labeled it "music", btw}.
When i ran disc utility, it said it couldn't be repaired or something similar. What happens if you try to look at the files that are on it? If you are able "to see the hard drive" it tells me that it probably has not experienced a hardware breakdown. So the problem may be a file system corruption, or something like that. The FAT32 file system is prone to that, and external drives are often supplied formatted in FAT32, because that file system can be utilized by both Mac and Windows machines. I again suggest that if you can get access to a Windows machine, you connect the drive to that machine; examine its "Properties," which among other things will indicate "FAT32" if that is its file system; see what files are indicated as present, if any; and if the music files are not indicated as being present run ChkDsk on the drive. Post back if you'd like further information on how to do that, indicating whether the machine has Windows XP or Vista or 7. Regards, -- Al |
No, you don't need to copy first to the internal drive. While I don't know anything about SuperDuper, and I don't know much about Macs in general, it seems clear that it is a disk cloner program that does not want to clone from a disk that is not formatted in HFS+ (Mac OS extended), either because it is not designed to be able to do that, or perhaps because the target disk may be HFS+.
BTW, the reference to "MS DOS" format undoubtedly means in more specific terms FAT32, which Mac OS's can work with, regardless of whether or not SuperDuper is able to.
My suggestion is that instead of bothering with the cloning utility, you simply use the file management provisions that are provided in the Mac OS to copy all of the files from one drive to the other. After doing that, as Toby suggested you should reformat the original drive, probably to HFS+, and then copy the files back to it. That would result in greatly reduced susceptibility to file system corruption, compared to FAT32, with the only downside being that it would no longer be compatible with Windows machines. If Windows compatibility is a consideration, you should reformat the drive anyway, after copying the files from it, but reformat to FAT32.
Regards,
-- Al |
When you say "file management provisions that are provided in the Mac OS ",
what are you referring to? Is there a easy way to do that? Herman and Toby can answer that much better than I can. As I said I have little knowledge about Macs. But I'm simply referring to whatever the conventional methods are in OS X for copying files. Regards, -- Al |
If i can't transfer a non mac formatted disc to another mac formatted disc with the superduper or clone software, where do i go from here? What I'm saying is don't clone the disk that has the files on it to the other disk, just copy the files to the other disk. That should be very simple and straightforward. Disk cloning and file copying are two very different things, done in different ways. Either one would provide you with the necessary backup, but since in this case the cloning program won't work, just do it by copying, instead. I can't reformat it without deleting it, correct? Correct. Be absolutely sure that you have successfully copied the files to the backup drive, before reformatting the first drive. Regards, -- Al |
I'm not sure either what benefit, if any, would be provided by having a cloned disk, as opposed to simply having a backup disk containing copies of the original files. Perhaps Toby will elaborate.
All I can envision is that it could possibly eliminate the need to point iTunes to a different music storage drive, if the original drive had to be replaced. That would take just a few clicks to do.
Basically, a cloned disk is a disk whose contents are identical to the ENTIRE contents of the original drive, including identification and structure-related information that is used by the operating system but is normally invisible to the user.
Under certain circumstances, having a clone can actually create problems, because (oversimplifying slightly) if both drives are connected simultaneously the operating system may get confused as to which is which.
Regards,
-- Al |
Excellent clarifications, Herman & Toby. Thanks. I believe that assignment of different names and creation times eliminates the possible concern I expressed about cloning. Cloning programs that I am familiar with, in the Windows world, will usually duplicate absolutely everything, including what is known as the "disk signature" in the drive's "master boot record," which among other things identifies the disk to the operating system. In case you're curious, the kinds of problems that can lead to, especially if the drive being cloned is an OS drive, are described here. Best regards, -- Al |
Hi Toby, It gets even more rigorous with Windows 7 and Vista, compared to XP which was addressed in the link I provided. And it has to be, or the clone of a W7 or Vista OS drive won't boot. Another reference that may be of interest. But as you imply, the word "clone" can be used in various senses. Best regards, -- Al |
