Issue with external HDD's

Stephen P

I have an external HDD that I had on my old Windows PC, it's a NTFS drive. I bought a new Iomega 1TB external HDD today. I'm trying to copy files from the NTFS drive onto the new drive. I've partitioned the new drive as per instructions with the drive. When I'm copying the files over the copy process freezes after a few MB's, I'm only copying about 800MB at a time. I have to restart my iMac and when it restarts the new drive isn't getting picked up by the system (I'm running 10.7.4). I have to unplug the drive and plug it back in before its detected.
What's going on? Is the problem with the files on the NTFS drive?
Any advice would be appreciated!

Sean Quagmire

I've partitioned the new drive as per instructions with the drive.

what format is the new drive partitioned in?

Stephen P

Mac OS Extended (Journaled)

The instructions also said to select GUID Partition Table.

Sean Quagmire wrote: »

I've partitioned the new drive as per instructions with the drive.

what format is the new drive partitioned in?

Sad Professor

Disconnect the new drive and try copying some of the data from the NTFS drive onto your Mac's internal HD. If it's successful, then reconnect the new drive and copy that data from your Mac's hard drive over to it. This should help you narrow down where the problem is.

Stephen P

Sad Professor wrote: »

Disconnect the new drive and try copying some of the data from the NTFS drive onto your Mac's internal HD. If it's successful, then reconnect the new drive and copy that data from your Mac's hard drive over to it. This should help you narrow down where the problem is.

I'll try that this evening, thanks. Would there generally be a problem copying files from a NTFS drive onto a Mac OS Extended (Journaled) drive? Is there a file size limit that can be copied at once?

J-blk

Stephen P wrote: »

Would there generally be a problem copying files from a NTFS drive onto a Mac OS Extended (Journaled) drive? Is there a file size limit that can be copied at once?

There shouldn't be - I do so all the time. I have had the odd permission problems when copying from an NTFS drive that was initially in a Windows Home Server, but nothing like what you're describing.

Are you using any 3rd party apps/plugins for NTFS support like NTFS-3G or Paragon's NTFS for Mac? I had some severe speed problems transferring from NTFS drives with an older edition of Paragon on Lion so that could be a possible issue too.

Stephen P

I did actually download NTFS-3G but caused an error and the NTFS drive wasn't even detected so I uninstalled it. The problem was happening before I installed that anyway.

The new hard drive is this one. The NTFS drive is a Western Digital My Book, I'm not sure what type of drive it is (SATA etc??). Would this matter?

J-blk wrote: »

There shouldn't be - I do so all the time. I have had the odd permission problems when copying from an NTFS drive that was initially in a Windows Home Server, but nothing like what you're describing.

Are you using any 3rd party apps/plugins for NTFS support like NTFS-3G or Paragon's NTFS for Mac? I had some severe speed problems transferring from NTFS drives with an older edition of Paragon on Lion so that could be a possible issue too.

Stephen P

Just been looking at the Iomega website and at the hard drive user manual. It says "If you will be using the drive only on Mac OS systems, use a Mac OS Extended (HFS+) format." .
Is this different to Mac OS Extended (Journaled)?
It goes on to say "NOTE: If you want to configure Time Machine to use your Iomega Hard Drive, the drive must be formatted Mac OS Extended."
I'm not using it with Time Machine so should I format it as Mac OS Extended (HFS+)?

Sad Professor

HFS+ = Mac OS Extended. They are the same thing.

muggyog

What type of connection are you using ( USB, Firewire 400/800 )?

You are getting yourself confused by the file formats. HFS+, HFS Plus and HFS extended are the same and this Mac format has been around since OS 8.1. The preferred journaled option is used to prevent disk errors and a must for external drives..


Actually I think your problem maybe related to having different transfer rates on the two drives. If you can copy from the NTFS drive to the Mac internal drive ( as suggested above ) you will confirm this.

J-blk

Stephen P wrote: »

The NTFS drive is a Western Digital My Book, I'm not sure what type of drive it is (SATA etc??). Would this matter?

It shouldn't really, though if both drives are connected via USB (and it would only be USB 2.0 on all Macs before the new batch announced this week), large transfers could "bottleneck" a bit but it shouldn't cause the machine to freeze completely.

I'd agree with Sad Professor that your best option right now is to try to copy from the NTFS drive itself to your internal hard drive, as this would help establish if the problem is the source or the destination drive and point us all in the right direction...

Stephen P

muggyog wrote: »

What type of connection are you using ( USB, Firewire 400/800 )?

You are getting yourself confused by the file formats. HFS+, HFS Plus and HFS extended are the same and this Mac format has been around since OS 8.1. The preferred journaled option is used to prevent disk errors and a must for external drives..

I'm using USB on both drives. Thanks.

J-blk wrote: »

It shouldn't really, though if both drives are connected via USB (and it would only be USB 2.0 on all Macs before the new batch announced this week), large transfers could "bottleneck" a bit but it shouldn't cause the machine to freeze completely.

I'd agree with Sad Professor that your best option right now is to try to copy from the NTFS drive itself to your internal hard drive, as this would help establish if the problem is the source or the destination drive and point us all in the right direction...

Thanks, I'll give that a go this evening and report back. If I have to copy them like that so be it, it'll be a tedious job but at least it'll sort the problem.

Stephen P

OK so after copying some files to my Mac's HD I tried copying them to the new drive but same issue, freezing after a few seconds. I tested copying an existing folder with files on the Mac's HD to the new drive and it copied with no issues.
The issue seems to be with the files that were on the NTFS drive.
Is there any way of changing the NTFS drive to Mac file system and keep all the files intact?

J-blk

Stephen P wrote: »

Is there any way of changing the NTFS drive to Mac file system and keep all the files intact?

Unfortunately no - trying to change from NTFS to another file format would be destructive, the drive would need to be formatted and all data would be erased.

Now that we know the problem is with the NTFS drive though, I still have the suspicion that something may be wrong with the NTFS drivers on your Mac, perhaps even because of the NTFS 3G installation (system level drivers like that don't always get removed as cleanly as apps).

Do you have access to a Windows machine or a BootCamp partition on the Mac? Try copying the same amount of files from the drive and if there are no problems, then the issue is definitely with the NTFS functionality on your Mac partition. How did you uninstall NTFS 3G? The "correct" way is outlined in this thread:

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3942492?start=0&tstart=0

Stephen P

The problem was existing before I installed NTFS-3G. I found uninstall instructions on another site and it appears to be uninstalled. I'll follow the steps outlined in the link below and see if that works.

Would the fact that the files transfer to my internal HD with no issues mean that the problems lies with my new HD?

J-blk wrote: »

Unfortunately no - trying to change from NTFS to another file format would be destructive, the drive would need to be formatted and all data would be erased.

Now that we know the problem is with the NTFS drive though, I still have the suspicion that something may be wrong with the NTFS drivers on your Mac, perhaps even because of the NTFS 3G installation (system level drivers like that don't always get removed as cleanly as apps).

Do you have access to a Windows machine or a BootCamp partition on the Mac? Try copying the same amount of files from the drive and if there are no problems, then the issue is definitely with the NTFS functionality on your Mac partition. How did you uninstall NTFS 3G? The "correct" way is outlined in this thread:

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3942492?start=0&tstart=0

Sad Professor

I would recommend doing more testing copying different files from your Mac HDD to the the Iomega. I have a hard time believing it's the files that are causing the crash.

Do you have any security, firewall or antivirus software installed?

J-blk

Wait a second, cause I missed this from one of your earlier posts: so you can successfully copy the files from the NTFS HDD to the internal Mac drive - no issues? But moving those same files to the new HFS+ formatted drive freezes? Then there is nothing wrong with the NTFS drivers on your system like I thought and neither is the NTFS HDD or files corrupted it would seem.

Copy a file or folder from the NTFS drive to the Mac HDD and check the permissions - does your user account have full read/write on them?

Stephen P

Sad Professor wrote: »

I would recommend doing more testing copying different files from your Mac HDD to the the Iomega. I have a hard time believing it's the files that are causing the crash.

Do you have any security, firewall or antivirus software installed?

No extra security or Firewall installed apart from Mac OS X Firewall but I think that may be turned off anyway. I'll test larger folders of files already on my Mac HD to see if it freezes.

J-blk wrote: »

Wait a second, cause I missed this from one of your earlier posts: so you can successfully copy the files from the NTFS HDD to the internal Mac drive - no issues? But moving those same files to the new HFS+ formatted drive freezes? Then there is nothing wrong with the NTFS drivers on your system like I thought and neither is the NTFS HDD or files corrupted it would seem.

Copy a file or folder from the NTFS drive to the Mac HDD and check the permissions - does your user account have full read/write on them?

I compared permissions to see if that was an issue and they're identical (I assume you mean by pressing Cmd+I for Get Info?).

When the file transfer freezes if I try to copy more files that were on the NTFS drive I get an error 50 message.

Stephen P

I tried copying 2 folders already on my Mac HD with a total file size of 7.5GB and it froze at 501.1MB.

I'm going to send the drive back and exchange for a better branded drive.

Sad Professor wrote: »

I would recommend doing more testing copying different files from your Mac HDD to the the Iomega. I have a hard time believing it's the files that are causing the crash.

Do you have any security, firewall or antivirus software installed?

Sad Professor

Yeah bring it back. It's probably a problem with the enclosure.

muggyog

Before you return the drive try one more thing.

Windows and Mac file permissions are not the same format. You may need to take convert the permissions on your NTFS files when you have them on your internal drive.

Do a 'get info" on your folder with the NTFS files. This is what you get.


Select the gearwheel icon at the bottom and choose Apply to enclosed items. See does this work.

Stephen P

It's packed in the box now to be sent back tomorrow.

Thanks all for the advice

You may see me back on here when I get the new drive if the problem still exists, hopefully not though I'll be pulling my hair out if it does :rolleyes:

muggyog wrote: »

Before you return the drive try one more thing.

Windows and Mac file permissions are not the same format. You may need to take convert the permissions on your NTFS files when you have them on your internal drive.

Do a 'get info" on your folder with the NTFS files. This is what you get.


Select the gearwheel icon at the bottom and choose Apply to enclosed items. See does this work.

J-blk

Stephen P wrote: »

You may see me back on here when I get the new drive if the problem still exists, hopefully not though I'll be pulling my hair out if it does :rolleyes:

Best of luck with the replacement - odd problem indeed, but Sad Professor may be right, it might be the enclosure itself. FWIW, I've been using these (all formatted as NTFS) and have had no problems using them with my Macs:

http://www.dabs.ie/products/samsung-1tb-s2-ultraslim-portable-usb-2-0-9-5mm-piano-black-7LF2.html?src=15

I have 3 of them .

Stephen P

I'll have to buy off memoryc.com as I purchase the original one off them and I'll get credit onto my account. I've been looking at this one http://www.memoryc.com/storage/externalharddrives/15tbcoreusb2desktopdrivepianoblack.html. It's out of stock at the moment. Would that be suitable for Mac?

J-blk wrote: »

Stephen P wrote: »

You may see me back on here when I get the new drive if the problem still exists, hopefully not though I'll be pulling my hair out if it does :rolleyes:

Best of luck with the replacement - odd problem indeed, but Sad Professor may be right, it might be the enclosure itself. FWIW, I've been using these (all formatted as NTFS) and have had no problems using them with my Macs:

http://www.dabs.ie/products/samsung-1tb-s2-ultraslim-portable-usb-2-0-9-5mm-piano-black-7LF2.html?src=15

I have 3 of them .

J-blk

Stephen P wrote: »

Would that be suitable for Mac?

You're almost certainly going to need to format it to HFS+ but other than that, yes, it should be perfectly fine - any USB 2.0 (or even 3.0) external hard drive should work just fine with a Mac hardware wise.