how mac saves a file while downloading - using a pen drive instead HDD

Hello to all,

I do a lot of downloads for my kind of work, and I want to understand how mac os x saves a file while downloading it

my main idea is to save my HDD for working all the time, so I am downloading all my files directly to a pen drive.

this idea really works, or the os x have to save a file to HDD before save it to a pen drive?

thanks for any idea!
raul

You could set a pen drive as the default download directory in your browser of choice. That said, you would have to ensure that the pen drive is plugged in any time you wanted to download anything. I just tested it and Firefox will download the file to your Downloads folder if the pen drive is not plugged in.

yes, i am doing it with firefox, but my question is:

am I helping my HDD saving files to a pen drive? or os x does not save data directly to a flash drive, need to go through HDD first?

I don't think you'll saving your hard drive a noticeable amount by saving to a flash drive. How much do you write to the disk? What kind of hard drive do you have?

i have an imac, original HD, and I save around 40-60gb everyday

tioraul said:

i have an imac, original HD, and I save around 40-60gb everyday

Click to expand...

That is quite a lot ... May I ask what kind of work you do ?
( Just out of interest )

Cheers ... McBie

press photo and tv media

What you would save in wear and tear to the internal HD you would be transferring to the external drive. So, you're going to be putting wear and tear on one of the two. What kind of external are you using?

Would an SSD drive be an option, although they are still limited in capacity.

Cheers ... McBie

i am using a flash drive, 64GB from kingston, pretty good performance...

so, for sure mac will only save in my flash drive and not caching in HDD before write in my external usb flash?