Setting Up an External HD

[Stokes]

Hello!
I'm just getting ready to sell off a Macbook Pro, and I'd like to copy all of it's contents onto a external HD. The intent is to then use that external hard drive to put all of my content onto a new machine at a later time.

I have an external HD that I put together using a 160GB HD that originally came in my first MacBook. It's inside a NexStar SX enclosure and connects via USB.

When I originally did that, I think I was intending to use it as a Time Machine back up, but I never really went about doing it.

When I plug it into my current MacBook Pro, it shows as a 55Gb storage. I'm guessing I partitioned it or something.

SO, I'm really dumb. So dumb that I couldn't even find useful information searching the forums. I think what I'd like to do is just reformat that HD, and then copy my current computers contents to it.

Can someone walk me through it step by step? I'd surely appreciate it.

 

[MacDawg]

Use Disk Utility to erase the drive

Connect your drive
Start Disk Utility (Utilities folder)
Select the drive in the left column
Select Erase from the menu

Use Carbon Copy Cloner to clone your internal HDD to the external

Woof, Woof - Dawg

 

[Bennieboy©]

finder>applications>time machine then let it run,

if your ok with ditching the data thats already on the HD run disk utility from the utilitys folder and format the HD

 

[JediMeister]

To prepare the drive for use as either storage or as a Time Machine backup, launch Disk Utility with the drive connected. Select the volume of the drive (marked by the number of GB and brand), then click the partition tab to the right. Change Volume Scheme to 1 partition, click Options and make sure it's GUID Partition Table, then click OK and then Apply on the Partition tab. It'll confirm that you want to erase/repartition.

You can clone your internal drive to the external drive without using Carbon Copy Cloner, also using Disk Utility. Go to the Restore tab, drag the Macintosh HD (your computer's internal hard drive), to the Source field, then the external drive volume (probably named Untitled after the repartition) to the Destination, and then click Restore. That will image your internal drive to the external and allow it to be used as a bootable backup.

 

[Stokes]

Hello Jedi, Bennie, & Dawg!
Thanks so much for the help. I do believe that got the drive cleaned free. I'm not sure what's going on, but it looks like the drive is a 55GB drive, and not the 160GB drive I thought it was. I believe I took it out of my 2.0Ghz MacBook, but I guess I could be mistaken.

Anyways, I'm getting this error now when I'm trying to restore my HD onto the external drive. I'm guessing that it's because I've more than 55GB of stuff, so it won't let me even start to copy it over.

I've almost 50GB of stuff in my iTunes account. Is there anyway of just not copying that stuff over? I should go through and delete a bunch of that crap anyways, but that's a long and tedious chore.

Thanks much!

 

[ayeying]

That looks like a 60GB drive (55.89GB usable)...

 

[Bennieboy©]

is it a time machine back up?

if so, i do think there is a way to restore certain things if you dont have the available room for everything on your new HD

found it partial time machine back up

 

[Stokes]

Well, I've now deleted enough of my iTunes (amazing how much stuff you can have in there that you never use), so I have less than the 55Gbs on my MacBook Pro. But, I'm still getting that same 'verify size' message.

Any ideas?