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CrossFireXT17

macrumors member
Original poster
Aug 16, 2006
62
0
Hey everyone well I'll be purchasing my first ever mac next week. But I have a few questions about iTunes settings and how to dual boot Windows

First iTunes... I got a 500GB External Harddrive which is formatted with HFS+ (which I have a program for Windows that allows Windows to read that drive as well). But if I want to store my iTunes collection on there, how would I get it so that if I plug it into my laptop (which is running Mac) and also plug it into my desktop (which is running Windows) it'd automatically read it the same? Like I don't want to have to keep "updating" my music settings in either of the Operating Systems. I just want to be able to plug it in and have it work fine, and then if I maybe download more music while I'm running Mac, that if I plug it back into my Windows PC it will autoupdate.

Next, I want to be able to run Windows side-by-side with Mac, but also be able to actually nativelly boot it as well. Is there any program that lets me use the same "partition" to be able to run it while running Mac, but then also boot it without Mac?

Thanks! :D
 

Vanarak19

macrumors 65816
Feb 18, 2008
1,060
32
the drive will have to be FAT32, or youll have to buy software thatll read HFS+ in windows. Id go with FAT32. Only thing, no files over 4GB, fat32 standard.

otherwise, its easy as cake to make both see it as an itunes library.
 

CrossFireXT17

macrumors member
Original poster
Aug 16, 2006
62
0
yea well I have a program for windows that allows me to read HFS+ drives, so its no problem there! I just wanted to use HFS+ because the 360 can read that as well (which gets rid of the filesize problem).

But I wasn't sure if there was something I had to do to make it work (iTunes I mean) with windows and mac.
 

dengar169

macrumors member
Sep 20, 2007
98
0
Is the program you're referring to called Macdrive? I have been wondering the same question. I have an external drive w/ all my songs,movies and pictures and I want to accomplish the same thing you want. For example, rip a cd in windows and add album covers, and text if need be, and THEN boot into leopard and have that same album already loaded onto my itunes with all the info I entered.
 

CrossFireXT17

macrumors member
Original poster
Aug 16, 2006
62
0
yes thats EXACTLY what I want to do!!!! and yes MacDrive is the program I'm referring to.

But yea, I really want to know if its possible
 

dengar169

macrumors member
Sep 20, 2007
98
0
I would say that theoretically it should be possilbe. If we changed the preferences on both itunes (windows and OSX) to have it's itunes folder at the same location, you know the "browse" option inside the advanced tab. I don't see why there would be a problem. My imac is going to be delivered tomorrow , otherwise I would have tried it already.

hey quick question for you. If I install Macdrive, does it have to be on a empty hard drive? Or can any external hard drive I have be viewed under windows?
 

alphaod

macrumors Core
Feb 9, 2008
22,183
1,245
NYC
I think you should install MacFuse on your OS X instead, put the drive a NTFS, so you don't need any funky programs in Windows to read the drive; the MacFuse will allow you to write to NTFS in OS X without any other programs.
 
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