Fusion and WIndows on External? [Archive]

View Full Version : Fusion and WIndows on External?

punkeb

Jul 16, 2009, 08:42 PM

I currently have Windows running through Fusion on my macbook. Is it possible for me to move that to an external hard drive and run it from there? I am trying to free up space on my internal by moving anything I can.
Thanks much

r.j.s

Jul 16, 2009, 08:43 PM

Yes, you can move the VM file.

punkeb

Jul 16, 2009, 08:45 PM

Thank you.
Sorry, but can you explain exactly what I need to move?
The folder called virtual machines?

r.j.s

Jul 16, 2009, 08:46 PM

Thank you.
Sorry, but can you explain exactly what I need to move?
The folder called virtual machines?

Not the whole folder, but inside should be one for your Windows install. Move that file. You'll have to tell Fusion where to look for it though.

punkeb

Jul 16, 2009, 08:51 PM

Ok, inside that folder there is an icon called "Windows XP Home Edition"
Is that the right item to move?
If so, when I open Fusion, what happens?
Sorry for such basic questions!
Thank you for the help!

r.j.s

Jul 16, 2009, 08:53 PM

punkeb

Jul 17, 2009, 10:14 AM

Thanks. Tried to move it to my external but it came up with an error message.
"Sorry the operation could not be completed because an unexpected error occurred."

live4ever

Jul 17, 2009, 10:27 AM

Make sure Fusion isn't running - and it is probably best to do a shut down of the vm and not just suspend it.

punkeb

Jul 17, 2009, 11:02 AM

Hmm...fusion hasn't been run in awhile and is shut down.

r.j.s

Jul 17, 2009, 11:56 AM

Restart, you should be able to move it after that.

punkeb

Jul 17, 2009, 02:39 PM

Ugh!
I restarted and I'm still getting the error.

The Flashing Fi

Jul 17, 2009, 03:12 PM

punkeb

Jul 17, 2009, 03:18 PM

I only use the Windows part once every few months or so, so I figured it was better to free up the space. I currently only have 12 GB free of 120 GB hard drive.

r.j.s

Jul 17, 2009, 06:14 PM

Honestly, you shouldn't move it to an external hard drive. You'll end up ruining the hard drive quicker. They simply not designed for continuous reading a writing operations that it will be under when running an OS off of it. External HDD's are intended more for storage.

Where do you get that from? A hard drive is a hard drive, there is no physical difference between an internal and an external when it comes to the head and platters.

punkeb

Jul 17, 2009, 08:09 PM

Thank you for trying to help me!
I am not sure why I am unable to copy i to my external. I guess I will just leave it as is.

The Flashing Fi

Jul 17, 2009, 08:17 PM

Where do you get that from? A hard drive is a hard drive, there is no physical difference between an internal and an external when it comes to the head and platters.

It's common knowledge. Many external enclosures are simply not designed for the HDD to be used continuously, mainly do to poor cooling of the drive. Additionally, while the HDDs in external enclosures are indeed the same as their desktop counterparts, operating systems do treat them differently. For instance, the onboard cache of the HDD is generally not used, because if you disconnect it, you risk data corruption and loss. The lack of the usage of the onboard cache means that when you write even small files to the HDD, it means that it will literally be written to the HDD, instead of the the cache (which is typically 16/32 mb of memory depending on the HDD). This causes the HDD to work "overtime." Over a short period of time, this can cause the external HDD to heat up, especially when working with files that you are saving changes often. Having the HDD overheat will severely limit its life.

For example, Vista has a resource monitor that you can open up and examine disk usage. Looking at it, I see several processes that are writing to the HDD, however, the HDD activity light never turns on. This is because the HDD's cache is being used. If this was running on an external HDD with the cache disabled, the light would literally constantly be on, because the HDD is constantly being written to.

However, Windows itself does have an option to enable the cache on plug-in play external HDDs, but is disabled by default. I assume that Mac OS X is the same way.

r.j.s

Jul 17, 2009, 08:26 PM

However, Windows itself does have an option to enable the cache on plug-in play external HDDs, but is disabled by default. I assume that Mac OS X is the same way.

You have it backwards, delayed write (disk caching) is enabled by default, and it means that often data is not actually written to the external until later, it is stored in the cache.

Bill Gates

Jul 17, 2009, 08:44 PM

It sounds to me like the OP is trying to move a >4GB file onto a FAT32 external drive.

r.j.s

Jul 17, 2009, 08:45 PM

It sounds to me like the OP is trying to move a >4GB file onto a FAT32 external drive.

That is a possibility.

punkeb

Jul 18, 2009, 08:13 PM

Ok, so I copied it to my Time Capsule. I then clicked to open Fusion and it came up with "this something (I forget) can not be found"
?