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I need help coping folders

steve knight

steve knight

macrumors 68030
Original poster
Jan 28, 2009
2,735
7,180
I was copying my itunes folder from a ntfs external driver to a new exteral mac formatted. it got stuck on a folder that was there already and stopped copying. there are about 50 gigs left. dragging them all to the folder again and choosing not to replace and checking the check box says it's copying. I don't think it is but it will take a long time to go through them all. any oractial way to get the last 50 gigs in the new folder?
 
steve knight said:
I was copying my itunes folder from a ntfs external driver to a new exteral mac formatted. it got stuck on a folder that was there already and stopped copying. there are about 50 gigs left. dragging them all to the folder again and choosing not to replace and checking the check box says it's copying. I don't think it is but it will take a long time to go through them all. any oractial way to get the last 50 gigs in the new folder?
Click to expand...

A faster solution would be to use a FireWire cable - if you aren't already. Another option that has worked for me is to move pieces of a big folder piece by piece. I don't know if its just me but sometimes it seems quicker to do it in small chunks. I mean 50GB, wow that is a lot.

If there are no folders with the same name of others folders that you are copying, it should be successful. Yes it will take a long time, but the copying process should be successful
 
the total was 300 gigs. I have found with usb the bigger the files the faster. lots of little files can slow things down. I tried copy and don't replace but it did not copy the last 50 gigs. so I just deleted the folder and used itunes to import them. went to bed expecting it to be done but nope only 1/2 done I think my mini went to sleep. took till this afternoon to finish. that was wore then on my pc. I really needed a move command that way any thing left is what was not copied. but I could not find that only copy.
 
steve knight said:
the total was 300 gigs. I have found with usb the bigger the files the faster. lots of little files can slow things down. I tried copy and don't replace but it did not copy the last 50 gigs. so I just deleted the folder and used itunes to import them. went to bed expecting it to be done but nope only 1/2 done I think my mini went to sleep. took till this afternoon to finish. that was wore then on my pc. I really needed a move command that way any thing left is what was not copied. but I could not find that only copy.
Click to expand...

Your iTunes folder is 300GB in size? I'm guessing that there are a ton of movies/tv shows.
 
When you copy large amounts of files, the computer starts from the begging, just look at the last copied file and start with the next one.
 
boast said:
you can try rsync. reading the man pages (typing 'man rsync' in terminal) you can see an option that states
Click to expand...

I never even though of using that. That could have saved me so much time in my previous UNIX migration plans. Thanks for the reminder.
 
KoolStar said:
When you copy large amounts of files, the computer starts from the begging, just look at the last copied file and start with the next one.
Click to expand...

but they are in folders so you can't tell what was missed. at least I could not figure out how. I had a hard enough time trying to find out the total size of the itunes folder.
 
so much to learn. downloaded and installed Thunderbird and have it on my dock. but every item I reboot I have the window that requires me to draw it over to applications. what am I missing? that does not happen with firefox or any other app.
 
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