MacBook :: Best External Portable Hard Drive - Any Recommendations?
Sep 29, 2009
I have a late 2007 150 GB Macbook Black. I'd like to finally backup my data and also use it for games or other storage to play directly from, cause I'm almost out of room on my my Macbook. What kind of portable hard drive do you use, or recommend?
I have a MacBook Pro (just got it this year) and I need a portable external hard drive. I also want to use it on my PC. Which interface would you suggest? I am not sure which connections my PC has but I know it has USB 3.0. Is there an interface on my MacBook that's faster than USB 3.0? If so, I might forget about connecting it to my PC, assuming it's significantly faster.
I want to move my photos from my laptop to an external hard drive. I already own a Seagate which is formatted for a PC, with photos already on it. I do not want to lose those photos and have been told by Apple tech that the seagate can be reformatted for mac. How do I do this without losing the PC photos already on it. Is there any difference between photos transferred from a PC or a MAC ?
Info: MacBook Pro (15-inch Early 2011), Mac OS X (10.6.8)
Could anyone recommend an external (FireWire 800) Hard Drive that they're using without issues with a Power Mac G5 (mine is a Dual Processor 2.3)?? I bought a couple of WD My Book Studio Edition but have no end of problems on FW800, and looking around here so is everyone else. LaCies seem to have similar problems, plus my own experiences in selling these and seeing FW ports falling off the enclosure's board, etc., puts me off them. Maxtors seem to have different issues and the new brown and orange Seagates are too fugly to even consider. So, anyone recommend a solution (250-500GB) that works fine with FW800 on a dual PMG5??
Would a USB bus-powered portable external hard drive (Like the WD Passport) be slower at backing up than an AC powered desktop external hard drive? I've got a desktop external hard drive that I'm using for Time Machine backups over WiFi connected to an airport extreme, but it's dieing and I'd like to replace it. Preferably I'd like to get a 1gb portable drive so I can use it for both backing up and travelling - however if it will result in slower speeds in transferring data then I'll just get a desktop drive.
I have a 15' macbook pro 250 gb HD 2 gb mem. And in the activity monitor it is showing space utilized 228.53 gb and free space at 4.04 gb? And I have only had the laptop for less than 2 years now, Is this normal? Is there a way to erase items so I have alot more free space? I also have an portable external hard 320 gb I use to back up my hard drive. Will this save my music and important items so I can erase items (music, etc.) off of hard drive? then when i need those items just plug the portable hard drive in? I really need my music for I am a DJ.
how I can be able to see my external hard drive? I've been using it before and was able to see it until I upgraded my OS to Mavericks....Now, I cannot find it in the finder but I can see it in the disk utility however, my mac does not allow me to do anything on it...I don't want to reformat coz I have important files in my hard drive...
I've had a LaCie Porsche Design for the last 6 years with no problems but with the upgrade to a MBP I'm looking to get a new portable hard drive (LaCie or another brand). My old LaCie was FW400 so I'd be looking at FW800 now. Which make and model do you use and are you happy with it's performance?
what hard drive is everyone using with their macbook pro? I am in this market for a portable external but alot of the reviews aren't that convincing. Looking for a rugged type ..500gb and higher.
I have a MacBook Pro 15 (2006) 2 ghz core duo, 2 gigs ram, & 100 gig 7200 RPM hard drive. I would like to change the the hard drive out to a larger one, but I'm seeing all kind of reviews & I'm not sure which ones to put more weight on. I have been looking at a 320 Gig or the 500 Gig. Looked at the Seagate, WD, & the Hitachi. I want to stay with the 7200 RPM. I also know there can be an issue with the, shock or drop sensor on the hard drives not being compatible with the laptops shock sensor, as well as heat & noise issues. I will state that this is my first Mac since the late 80s. But that I have a several very good friends that are long time Mac users and that have done this type of switch out, so while I know that the switch out is more complicated than some I have good tech support on that side of this switch out.
I recently purchased this Portable (iomega) 500GB hard drive. I just realized it only works on my Mac's USB ports, but not with my USB Hub. Does it exceed the power limit of the USB Hub? I don't see how it is possible, because I currently have nothing else plugged into it, and it uses a power adapter.
It worked with my old Hard Drive, which is big and uses a power adapter. Now it doesn't seem to work. Also I tried on just a USB adapter that makes the cable longer, still doesn't work. Only the MBP ports work! However, the hub works for things such as phone charger, and speakers right now.
I have a WD 320gb portable hard drive which has been formatted as Journaled for about 3 months. Just yesterday i decided to format the 320gb hd as FAT32 as i heard that Mac disk utility is able to format this type in excess of the 32gb that windows is able too. This now allowed me to have the HD be read by Mac and windows with ease, or so i thought. So i did that, and copied all my data onto it and ever since it has been a bit patchy.. The drive is recognised instantly by windows computers and functions fine but when plugged into my macbook sometimes it will not display at all, other times it will take a long time to read, and in other cases it will function perfectly. When the drive refuses to be read by mac I checked disk utility and it shows that the HD is definately connected but just wont show up on my desktop.
I am new to Mac OS. I have a new MBP 15'. I have bought a Western Digital 750GB hard drive and I even used it once to back up using Time Machine. Now I was thinking that Can I use the same hard drive on Windows and Mac both to store media? At present as it is formatted in Mac OS (Extended ) format, I think it is not recognised by Windows. But can we create such partitions of the portable drive that one of the partition can be used for Time Machine back ups and other one as FAT32 for media storage from both Windows and Mac?
I've been backing up my MacBook Pro on an external portable hard drive. I need to delete some but not all the files from that portable hard drive permanently. When I highlight them and click to move them to Trash I get a message telling me this cannot be done because they are Read Only files? How do I go about it. I am required by work to delete them off this hard drive. Do I have to reformat the hard drive? If so how do I go about it?
I recently got myself a MacBook Pro and I'm having problems transferring files from my old Windows XP based laptop. I downloaded the Windows Migration Assistant onto my old laptop but everytime I tried to run it I got various error messages telling me I needed to upgrade this and that. Now the laptop has decided to give in totally and won't switch on at all! I do have all my music etc backed up onto an external hard drive but when I connect it to my MacBook it just doesn't want to know, I assume as all the data on there is formatted as Windows.
Info: MacBook Pro (13-inch, Mid 2012), Mac OS X (10.7.4)
Got a slight problem transferring files from my Macbook Pro to my portable hard drive. My portable hard drive is partitioned into NTFS and FAT 32. The files are over 4gb big so ultimately I cant copy it to the FAT 32 partion and NTFS doesnt seem to work with mac books
I am looking for a portable hard-drive which matches low-weight and great capacity. I would like to use it for TimeMachine and as a collector for movies, photos, songs and DMGs. There are any hard drive which matches my needs at the Apple's store?! Next question, which file-system is better to use: Fat or Apple's ?!
To provide some background on my issue, my portable hard drive format was NTFS, and I wished for it to be FAT-32. I was trying to transfer some files over from my Windows computer to my Mac, however it wouldn't work due to the formatting. To change the formatting, I used some third-party software and started the conversion (without formatting the drive so that I could keep all my files) however mid way through the process, my stupid laptop entered sleep mode and stopped everything.
When I tried to re-plug the hard drive in my Mac, it didn't show up in the finder, but the Disk Utility did find it. The model I have is the iStorage DiskGenie portable hard drive.
I have a WD Passport Portable hard drive which I use as a Time Machine for my iMac.I'm close to filling it up and I will be getting a bigger hard drive for it.I would like to use my WD hard drive again on my daughters PC so she can save her school work. I know it needs to be re-formatted to work with a PC again but I dont know how to do it.
I replaced the 250G drive in my imac with a 1T (SATA) drive 2 years ago, but now the 1T drive is close to capacity. I was wondering if anyone had any internal hard drive recommendations for a 2T drive. I have been having some strange problems lately with my imac locking up with only the mouse responding that may or may not be hard drive related. I was using a Seagate drive but I would like to go with someone else.
Can I put boot camp onto a portable/external HDD and change boot options to run the HDD on start up? I have a very new macbook (its my first mac), so don't want to start messing around with partitions etc., as I am very new to macs...
I'm also wondering if there is a Linux/Ubuntu emulator available for the mac? And if there is one, would it be possible to partition an external hardrive into three segments, one for Bootcamp, one for Linux, and one for time capsule?
With a firewire drive, can I have the drive hooked up to my iMac via firewire, but also have it accessed through USB to my Time Capsule for wireless access?
I just recently bought a LaCie 500GB Rikki portable hard drive. Anyways I'm trying to back up my Address Book to it. So I drag the Address Book to the hard drive thinking it would back up all my contacts. Went to test it on my wife's MacBook Pro, it just shows her contacts in there and not mine. What am I doing wrong?
I was wondering if anyone had any thoughts or preferences on a good 500gb (or more) portable hard drive for Time Machine on my Macbook. I need it to be portable because I travel quite a bit.
I have been looking at the Seagate FreeAgent Go 500 GB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive ST905003FAA2E1-RK but I can't tell a) if this will work for my macbook and b) if it will work for Time Machine.
Any thoughts or recommendations? Would any portable hard drive that I buy on Amazon work for Time Machine?
I recently received a 'phillips usb 2.0 200gig portable storage drive. I managed to get it be recognized by my ibook g4 once and so I reformatted it for mac. Now when I try to plug it in nothing happens and it isn't found when I try disk utility. The funny thing is. When I plug it into my sisters macbook pro it is instantly found, mounted on the desktop and works as it should.
Since not all Portable External Drives are Mac compatible, I need to ask for your advise, Any 250gb or 320gb will be ok, of course something high quality, and compact as well.