SillyDog701

[EddiePaxil]

OK. First I should let you know what I've got. A Power Mac AGP w/ Sonnet upgrade processor. 512 Ram (waiting on another 512 that's shipping) Running OS X 10.3.9. I have two internal Hard Drives currently installed via ATA. One is a 10 GB WDC journaled and writable which is where OS X was installed to. The other a 25 GB Maxtor journaled and writable. I have another External Hard Drive 120 GB firewire that I haven't plugged in. Three Log In names, one protected w/ File Vault. Any other info that would help let me know.

Basically what I want to do is simple in theory but who knows if it's simple in practice. Currently my OS, applications, programs, and associated files are in the 10 GB Hard Drive. Not giving me a whole lot of breathing room. i.e. ITunes, IPhoto, and a couple of other apps save data to this HD by default. I use the second HD for Misc. storage. Session files for songs and such. I want to reverse their roles if that's possible. I want the 25 to house my OS and apps and the 10 for extra storage being that the external will soon take over that role primarily.

I basically want to know if there's a way to copy or transfer all the info on the "main" 10 GB HD to the 25 GB HD.

Any insight or help would be appreciated, thanks.

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[Antony]

Eriel,

I assume your 2nd HDD (25GB one) is free. Or you can shift the content to the 10GB one.

My method is not smart, you will need to re-install OS X and all applications.

Firstly, I would like to suggest you unprotect the FileVault.

Next, create another admin user account for the current OS X.

Login to that Admin, and delete all other users. The Mac should ask you if you want to back up all the preferences and data of to-be-deleted user, [u]select yes[/b]. This will create a disk image for that user. Repeat for all users.

Note: I would suggest you back up all your files somewhere before deleting user accounts.


I would suggest you format your 2nd HDD, and partition it. You can do that with Disk Utility (under Utilities folder under Applications folder). Remember to back up your files first. A good way to back them up is to create a Disk Image, again use Disk Utility to do it.

Then, insert insert your Mac OS X Panther disc then reboot from CD.
If the system does not boot up from CD automatically, try change the Startup Disk (under System Preference), OR holding down C during booting.

Then, install Panther to the new HDD. (you should call the HDD a different name). And after installation, you should apply System Update again to the latest Panther. Next log into the new OS X (in new HDD), and start creating users (with same username). Copy the disk images of previous users to your new HDD.
Log into each user, and open the disk images created previously, and copy all the files to that user. (You can leave the Library folder section later.)
If you can't copy the file out or the file can't be used, you will need shell commands to overwrite permissions.
(Ask me if you need help on shell commands to overwrite permissions/ownership.)

Next, re-format the 10HDD, you can use the same Disk Utility to do so.

When you have time, install all your applications back to the new HDD.

Hope this helps.

(Note: make backups, I am not responsible for any data lost.)

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[EddiePaxil]

Finished flipping Hard Drives. Thanks alot Anthony. It went relatively smooth.

There was a snag with Quicktime 7.0. It worked great until I installed my Pro Tools Software. I'm sure Apple will have a fix for it soon. Those of us in audio are big customers I'm sure it's a priority.

Thanks again, I now have some breathing room in the HDD w/ my OS. And plenty of Storage w/ the other 2 HDD's for my sessions.

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[LearnTech]

Hey, Anthony. I just wanted to come on here and tell you that you may have very well made an extremely complicated situation into a very sound one. I'm going through a very, very similar (if not almost identical) situation now with transferring important files from hard drive to hard drive at my job where I utilize a mac. I'll certainly utilize your advice to the best extent I can and I'll let you know how everything went. If it goes well, consider yourself a hero. If not, then that just means I'm dumb and I missed something. Ha ha!

hidden spamming section removed

Anyway, thanks for sharing the info! =)

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[joem]

Hi i here, once i I tried to revive my hard drive, i couldn't get rid of file errors until I flipped the drive over. Having the drive sit upside down fixed it temporarily so I could copy everything over.

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