Time machine messed up permissions on my external hard drive. HELP PLEASE!

[tooshaggy]

I have a g5 ppc running the newest OSX.
Somehow my startup folder got corrupted and my computer would not start up. so I did a restore from time machine. The restore worked ok. I have 2 external hard drives attached to my computer, one for time machine and one for iTunes and movies.
After restore and restart my computer said the hard drive attatched could not be repaired by disk utility. I did not ask it to fix anything.
Now, I don't have permission to write to my external hard drive on the non time machine hard drive. When I get info, the lock on the bottom is not available, and I can't modify anything.
Can I fix this by going into the terminal? And how? Or what.
Thanks!!

 

[BlueRevolution]

I have a g5 ppc running the newest OSX.

No you don't. The newest version of OS X, Snow Leopard, doesn't run on PowerPC Macs. I presume you're talking about Leopard.

Can I fix this by going into the terminal?

Yes. Open a Terminal window and run the following command:

sudo chown -R [your short name]:[your short name] /Volumes/[volume name]

 

[tooshaggy]

I tried the command, one time it asked for a password, then it says "invalid argument".
Ant other ideas??
Please help!!!!!!!!!

 

[BlueRevolution]

If you have spaces in your volume name, you'll need to escape them like so:

sudo chown -R mikkel:mikkel /Volumes/Ministry\ of\ Peace

 

[tooshaggy]

I did it like you said, and yes I have a space in my volume name.
It is called "HAL 05"
I got thtis:
usage: chown [-fhv] [-R [-H | -L | -P]] owner[:group] file ...
chown [-fhv] [-R [-H | -L | -P]] :group file ...
And I still can't edit the disc. Next help!! THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!
Mac Rumors forums rocks.

 

[BlueRevolution]

You mistyped the command. What did you run, exactly?

 

[tooshaggy]

Perhaps I'm retarded. This is what I have entered.

Last login: Sun Jan 17 17:10:05 on ttys000
Macintosh-5:~ mattg$ sudo chown -R mattg:mattg/ Volumes/ HAl\05
Password:
chown: mattg/: Invalid argument
Macintosh-5:~ mattg$ sudo chown -R mattg:mattg /Volumes/HAL\05
chown: /Volumes/HAL05: No such file or directory
Macintosh-5:~ mattg$ sudo chown -R mattg:mattg /Volumes/HAl 05
chown: /Volumes/HAl: No such file or directory
chown: 05: No such file or directory
Macintosh-5:~ mattg$

 

[BlueRevolution]

Well, the last one is the closest you got to correct.

sudo chown -R mattg:mattg /Volumes/HAL\ 05

You can copy and paste the command into the Terminal window if you like.