Using encryption on external hard drive

[leeuk321]

Does anyone use file encryption on an external hard drive? I have a Macbook with a 256gb hard drive, and also use a 2tb portable drive for media, such as my photos. I'm wanting to use file encryption on the drive, so I formatted a spare portable drive with the MacOS OS Extended (Journaled, Encrypted) file system, to test how it works. Set a password, great. Stored the password in my keychain, great.

Then the issue came - I realised that every time I go to copy or delete a file on the drive, finder asks me for the password. Every. Single. Time. And if I try to do something outside of finder, such as copy a photo in Adobe Bridge onto the drive, it says that "the operation cannot be completed because you don't have sufficient permissions".

Obviously, this makes using an external drive for daily tasks absolutely impossible. The reason I'm wanting to encrypt the external drive is so that in the unlikely event of theft, someone can't get access to the files on my Macbook or external drive. My Macbook has File Vault enabled, and I'm pretty much just wanting the external drive to act in the same manner. i.e. the drive is unlocked on startup, and then it remains unlocked and accessible to all programs without having to constantly enter the password.

Am I doing something stupid, or missing something really obvious? Any advice would be greatly appreciated

 

[Weaselboy]

Hmm... it sounds like you set it up correctly. I always encrypt my external drives and once you attach them and they mount, they work just like any other drive in Finder.

Try this out... open Disk Utility and right click then eject the drive. Then go to Keychain and find the entry for the drive and delete it. Then go back to Disk Util and right click then mount. You should get the password popup where you can enter the password and check the box to save the password in Keychain.