Which adapters FW800 drive to 2020 iMac

[Dannydematio]

Am I correct in thinking I need the following to connect a FireWire 800 external hard drive to a 2020 iMac.

1x Apple Firewire to Thunderbolt

1x Apple Thunderbolt 2 to Thunderbolt 3

I can not just plug the Apple firewire to Thunderbolt in, because presumably it’s Thunderbolt 2 only.

I need to get some critical files off a 4TB FW800 drive.

If somebody could confirm it will be appreciated

Thanks

 

[Juicy Box]

You got it right.

The bidirectional adapter is kind of expensive and only Apple makes one, but I got one for cheap on ebay to use TB3 devices with my Late 2012 iMac.

 

[justashooter]

Just a thought. Buy an inexpensive external enclosure with USB3 like this:

Vantec NexStar TX 3.5" SATA to USB 3.0 External Hard Drive Enclosure - Micro Center

Get it now! The NST-328S3-BK is a simple well design enclosure ready for 3.5 SATA HDD. This new TX series enclosure offers sleek aluminum casing for heat protection and minimize vibration.

www.microcenter.com

or a hard drive dock like this:

Micro Center - Computers and Electronics

Micro Center - Computers and Electronics - Thousands of products to buy: desktops, laptops, monitors, build your own PC parts, upgrades, digital imaging, printing supplies, portable devices, audio equipment, software, video games, movies, tech books, plus repair service, store hours, directions...

www.microcenter.com

or this one holds 2 drives:

Vantec NexStar TX Dual Bay 2.5"/3.5" SATA to USB 3.0 Hard Drive Dock - Micro Center

Get it now! The NST-428S3-BK SuperSpeed USB 3.0 Dual Bay Hard Drive Dock is a features unit that will let you add or swap hard drives with your computer. Integrated with the latest USB 3.0 technology and USAP support, this dock can help speed up file copy and cloning.

www.microcenter.com

If it is an old IDE drive instead of SATA use this:

Vantec SATA/IDE to USB Hard Drive Adapter - Micro Center

Get it now! The SATA/IDE-USB Adapter gives you the flexibility of connecting almost any type of drive to your computer via USB. SATA, 3.5" IDE, 5.25" IDE, and 2.5" IDE drives are all supported and can be easily hot-swapped to your system.

www.microcenter.com

and remove the drive from the Firewire 800 enclosure. it would be less expensive than all the adapters.

 

[Dannydematio]

You got it right.

The bidirectional adapter is kind of expensive and only Apple makes one, but I got one for cheap on ebay to use TB3 devices with my Late 2012 iMac.

Thanks. I’ll take a look.

 

[Dannydematio]

Just a thought. Buy an inexpensive external enclosure with USB3 like this:

Vantec NexStar TX 3.5" SATA to USB 3.0 External Hard Drive Enclosure - Micro Center

Get it now! The NST-328S3-BK is a simple well design enclosure ready for 3.5 SATA HDD. This new TX series enclosure offers sleek aluminum casing for heat protection and minimize vibration.

www.microcenter.com

or a hard drive dock like this:

Micro Center - Computers and Electronics

Micro Center - Computers and Electronics - Thousands of products to buy: desktops, laptops, monitors, build your own PC parts, upgrades, digital imaging, printing supplies, portable devices, audio equipment, software, video games, movies, tech books, plus repair service, store hours, directions...

www.microcenter.com

or this one holds 2 drives:

Vantec NexStar TX Dual Bay 2.5"/3.5" SATA to USB 3.0 Hard Drive Dock - Micro Center

Get it now! The NST-428S3-BK SuperSpeed USB 3.0 Dual Bay Hard Drive Dock is a features unit that will let you add or swap hard drives with your computer. Integrated with the latest USB 3.0 technology and USAP support, this dock can help speed up file copy and cloning.

www.microcenter.com

If it is an old IDE drive instead of SATA use this:

Vantec SATA/IDE to USB Hard Drive Adapter - Micro Center

Get it now! The SATA/IDE-USB Adapter gives you the flexibility of connecting almost any type of drive to your computer via USB. SATA, 3.5" IDE, 5.25" IDE, and 2.5" IDE drives are all supported and can be easily hot-swapped to your system.

www.microcenter.com

and remove the drive from the Firewire 800 enclosure. it would be less expensive than all the adapters.

Justashooter,

that’s sharp shooting outside the Box!

I hadn’t thought of that but your quite right. In theory a usb-3 enclosure should do the job.

I had another look at the drive, and it’s a western digital mybook 2TB holding 2x1TB. I just need to look see if they are SATA (I think so) or IDE.

I’m definitely going to consider this option.

Having said that, I also have a collection of mini DV tapes and a Sony mini DV deck that I should transfer the video to a HD. In which case I will need the FW800 adapter cable, I already have a FW 400 to 800 adapter.

still an enclosure would be quick

many thanks

 

[Fishrrman]

OP:

It's NOT WORTH THE MONEY to buy the 2 adapters.

You are better off to:
- Pry open the firewire case
- Take the drive OUT of the enclosure
- Buy a new USB3 enclosure ... or... a USB3/SATA docking station. The docks are great solutions to handling multiple "bare drives".

Doesn't the drive also have a USB2 connection?
What happens if you use a USB2 cable and plug it into the Mac?

 

[Dannydematio]

OP:

It's NOT WORTH THE MONEY to buy the 2 adapters.

You are better off to:
- Pry open the firewire case
- Take the drive OUT of the enclosure
- Buy a new USB3 enclosure ... or... a USB3/SATA docking station. The docks are great solutions to handling multiple "bare drives".

Doesn't the drive also have a USB2 connection?
What happens if you use a USB2 cable and plug it into the Mac?

HI, Fishrrman,

I believe I had a problem with this USB connection on that FW800 drive. I suspect the cable, because it has the small USB contact on the drive end, and standard USB on the other. (seemed kinda loose on close inspection)

I am pretty sure that this cable cost me the option to clone my CCC back up when I first started up my new iMac 2020. I did everything precisely as you detailed, and I never got the option come up to migrate anything. Then, after I went through the standard set up, I saw the USB drive had indeed mounted. I next tried apple migration assistant. it recognised the USB drive, so I selected what I wanted (photos/apps/settings only) and let it run.

I got the message "migrating your data" and starting up, so looking good, but I could not see any movement on the progress bar. Haven't not done this ever before, I had to assume it was just going to be a slow process. 40 hours later, I could still see no activity, so I cancelled the process and I could now see that absolutely nothing had happened! arghhhh....

So I suspect the the cable. I do have a bunch of USB cables lying around with the same connectors. I suppose I could try a different cable, but I got fed up and left everything to go use my shiny new 2020. I thought I would just get the adaptors and return to it later.

Now that I had a few days to think, I realised that I have another reason to have the TB fire wire option, because I have 20 or so mini DV tapes of video footage that I really should edit/move onto HD for BU. I have a Sony mini DV deck with is FW400, but I have the FW400/800 adapter, so the FW800 to TB3 will be required for that later.

I had been using this CCC BU drive (Western digital 2TB) as a single 2TB volume. Originally it was Rad 0.
I assume if I put it into a totally different enclosure, I will still see a single 2TB drive as before?

This is a classic case of somebody upgrading after 10 years from a reliable system to the latest standards, but caught out by a huge transformation in connection standards etc.

Incidentally, when I do finally access the CCC BU, do you have a suggestion which is the best way to move my old high Sierra library to the 2020 iMac?

I know you can use options, when photos start up, to select an external drive. In fact, its a bit tricky, because what I actually want is to keep my photos library on the external 1TB SSD I bought for that. I am thinking that I probably should move my system photos library onto that external SSD first, then merge the old CCC library on that SSD? Or move the old library onto the 2020 first, and then move it all to the SSD?

I am going to Back up the 1TB external SSD to a very large capacity TB-3 external HD. I will partition that so I have a separate volume for Photos, time machine and probably another CCC back up. In hindsight, the CCC BU wasn't much good to me, (going from HS to Catalina didn't help) a TM BU, would have been easier from what I have since read. to be frank, I never used to bother with Apple TM in the past.

Lastly, I will say I am absolutely blown away with the the speed of this iMac 2020. Not even the fastest option (3.8 8-core i7 5700XT) It starts up like lightning compared to before. 4k video files are just unreal to work with. Photos look fab on the 5k screen. Its funny because you get so used to a machine and its limitation and you don't realise you're actually down on your hands and knees crawling through the mud, whilst everybody is passing you so fast you didn't even notice them. I suppose history will repeat itself!

Many Thanks


PS. I do not see the video card glitch lots reported. I did see it on first start up and after updating, no sign, so thankfully Apple software fix.

 

[Fishrrman]

OP:

You have been flopping around like a fish out of water in this forum for a week or two now with your "drive problem".

Take some pics of the drive that is giving you a problem.
Front/back/sides/connections
Post them here so we can have a look at it.

Is the problem drive "openable"?
Are there screws easily visible that might permit you to disassemble it?
Even if there are not, it's still possible to literally "pry it open" and extract the internal drive from inside.

Do you have an Apple Store anywhere close?
Have you considered taking it to them, to see if they can mount it, and possibly extract the data?

 

[ght56]

The cost of the two adapters is almost as much as the cost of a brand new 2TB 3.5-inch HDD and a cheap enclosure. Chances are if that hard drive has FW800 that it is near or at the end of its service life. If you still have an older Mac that has a FW800 port built in, I would purchase a new drive and then, using the older Mac, transfer the data from the old hard drive to the new one, and retire the FW drive. Even if you do wind up getting the adapters later on for other purposes, this drive is near, at, or past the end of its service life and using in in RAID0 is even more risky.

Finally, I am not clear as to if the problem drive (which is two 1TB HDDs) is currently operating in RAID0? This has huge implications in terms of the best way to get data off the problem drive.

 

[Dannydematio]

OP:

You have been flopping around like a fish out of water in this forum for a week or two now with your "drive problem".

Take some pics of the drive that is giving you a problem.
Front/back/sides/connections
Post them here so we can have a look at it.

Is the problem drive "openable"?
Are there screws easily visible that might permit you to disassemble it?
Even if there are not, it's still possible to literally "pry it open" and extract the internal drive from inside.

Do you have an Apple Store anywhere close?
Have you considered taking it to them, to see if they can mount it, and possibly extract the data?

Ok. I’ve got the drive connected today via adapters. I have a dual purpose for getting the FW-TB adapter so it’s all good.

Everything is good on the drive, it is a cloned bootable BU of my old OSX HIgh Sierra iMac.

Now I just need to get my old photos library off it and onto my new iMac.

I just want to move the old photos library over, in the most efficient way.

Thanks to everyone who commented/ helped, much appreciated.

 

[Fishrrman]

OP wrote:
"Now I just need to get my old photos library off it and onto my new iMac.
I just want to move the old photos library over, in the most efficient way."

OK, here's something to try.
The new iMac doesn't have any pics in the [new] Photos library yet, does it?

If your answer is "no", here's what to do:
1. Connect the cloned backup to the NEW iMac
2. Let the drive icon mount on the desktop
3. Click on the icon ONE TIME to select it
4. Bring up the "get info" box (command-i)
5. At the bottom of get info, click the lock and enter the password for your NEW iMac.
6. In sharing and permissions, put a check into "ignore ownership on this volume"
7. Close get info. This prevents permissions problems copying from the old iMac to the new one.

Hopefully what follows will work if the older Photos library isn't too old. IF IT DOESN'T WORK, there are other ways.
You will need to open two windows.
a. The first window -- on the NEW iMac, open the "Users" folder.
b. You should see the icon for your home folder. Open it.
c. Open the folder, "pictures".
d. Is there a "Photos Library" icon (may or may not be there)?
e. If it IS there, DELETE it. Move it to the trash and empty the trash. If it IS NOT there, don't worry about it, proceed to next step.
f. Close the "pictures" folder. You want to see the home folder (open) in this window.

g. Now, navigate into your home folder on the backup drive.
h. You want to have the "pictures" folder open so you can see your old "Photos Library" icon (it's actually a folder with A LOT of stuff inside).
i. Now, grab this icon with the mouse and drag it over the "pictures" folder (inside your NEW home folder) and "drop it into" it.
j. It should copy everything over. May take some time, depending on how large the library is.
k. When done, unmount and disconnect the backup drive.

Now comes the moment of truth:
Open the Photos app and see if it "finds" the older library and opens it.

I'm thinking that if the library isn't too old, Photos will "grab and run" with it.

IF THIS DOESN'T WORK...
Another way might be to the connect the backup, open Photos, and see if it will import the entire old library through its "import" feature.

 

[Dannydematio]

I was going to try option 2 "import feature" earlier, but I hesitated as I thought I might loose time stamp data on each image, so I will go with your first suggestion and see if I can get photos to open the older library.

I had to leave the iMac for a while as I am on call, so will get into this when I return, and report.

Thanks again for taking the time to outline outline the steps necessary.