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Mac newbie, external drives and data transfer

E

escapea78

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Mar 12, 2011
3
0
Hi all,
I'm going to recieve my first ever Mac on Wednesday so am very excited!

I wonder if anyone can help me out with a few questions.

1.) I will need to bootcamp with windows 7, is it possible to share an external HDD or usb with both systems? Can I just format the usb/HDD so that it works for both OSX and Windows?

2.)I have a desktop PC that I need to transfer data from. Best way to transfer I guess would be from PC to external HDD to MBP. Any quicker/easier ways to do it?

3.) How easy is it to transfer my itunes catalogue from desktop to MBP, without losing all songs, apps etc.? i think I can just copy the itunes file from PC to MBP. Is this the case?

Thanks to all who help, have a good weekend!
 
1. Yes. You can either format it as FAT32 (4GB file size limit) or exFAT which are natively accessible from both OSs, or you could format it as NTFS and install NTFS-3G for OS X. For Time Machine, you will need a HFS+ partition though.

2. You could connect them via Gigabit Ethernet to your router and then transfer the data over network but external HD method is a lot easier.

3. Just copy your library to the Mac and hold alt while starting iTunes so you can select the library.
 
escapea78 said:
Hi all,
I'm going to recieve my first ever Mac on Wednesday so am very excited!

I wonder if anyone can help me out with a few questions.

1.) I will need to bootcamp with windows 7, is it possible to share an external HDD or usb with both systems? Can I just format the usb/HDD so that it works for both OSX and Windows?

2.)I have a desktop PC that I need to transfer data from. Best way to transfer I guess would be from PC to external HDD to MBP. Any quicker/easier ways to do it?

3.) How easy is it to transfer my itunes catalogue from desktop to MBP, without losing all songs, apps etc.? i think I can just copy the itunes file from PC to MBP. Is this the case?

Thanks to all who help, have a good weekend!
Click to expand...
1.) yes just remember to have the right format.
2.) ithink its the most convenient and safest
3.) just copie the whole itunes library to the HDD and copy it to the itunes media on the the mac.


Ps. You made an exelent choice. Have fun with your awesome new computer
 
Thanks for the quick advice guys.
I'm going to buy new HDD and USB tomorrow/Monday. Is there anything I should look out for/ avoid in the devices?
Again thanks!
 
escapea78 said:
Thanks for the quick advice guys.
I'm going to buy new HDD and USB tomorrow/Monday. Is there anything I should look out for/ avoid in the devices?
Again thanks!
Click to expand...

Not really. Just make sure they drive you buy comes with a good warranty. If you don't need a lot storage, you could take a look at 2.5" external HDs. They go up to 1TB but the nice thing is that they don't need an external power adapter, so all you got to do is plug in the USB. Very handy while on the go.
 
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