Issues with new HDD & transferring files

I have an external HDD that I had on my old Windows PC, it's a NTFS drive. I bought a new Iomega 1TB external HDD today. I'm trying to copy files from the NTFS drive onto the new drive. I've partitioned the new drive as per instructions with the drive. When I'm copying the files over the copy process freezes after a few MB's, I'm only copying about 800MB at a time. I have to restart my iMac and when it restarts the new drive isn't getting picked up by the system (I'm running 10.7.4). I have to unplug the drive and plug it back in before its detected.
What's going on? Is the problem with the files on the NTFS drive?
Any advice would be appreciated!

How have you partitioned the new drive by "as per instructions with the drive"? What format is the new drive?

There should be no need to follow any instructions that come with the drive. Just open Disc Utility and format it in there as Mac OS Extended(Journaled)

The instructions state...

1. Select Applications - Utilities - Disk Utility.
2. In the left hand column, click on the drive icon for the Iomega Hard Drive. Make sure you click on the orange drive icon, not the volume icon.
3. Select the Partition tab.
4. Select Mac OS Extended (Journaled) from the Format drop-down menu.
5. Click on the Options button.
6. Select the type of partition needed for your Mac -
7. GUID Partition Table for bootability on an Intel-based Macintosh computer.
   Apple Partition Map for a PowerPC-based Mac.
8. Click OK.
9. Click Partition button. The drive is ready to use when the format completes.

I've done all the above. Would there generally be an issue copying files from a NTFS drive onto a Mac OS Extended (Journaled) drive? Is there a file size limit when copying?

MightyGem said:

How have you partitioned the new drive by "as per instructions with the drive"? What format is the new drive?

There should be no need to follow any instructions that come with the drive. Just open Disc Utility and format it in there as Mac OS Extended(Journaled)

Click to expand...

Sounds like a communications issue is the old drive in an enclosure?

Are both drives connected by USB?

Both drives are enclosed and connected via USB to computer.

mrplow said:

Sounds like a communications issue is the old drive in an enclosure?

Are both drives connected by USB?

Click to expand...

I'd have initially thought it was the peak traffic in and out on the USB bus was causing timeouts but if the detection issue remains on restart I'd say it's most likely a hardware/enclosure issue.

It may not be your issue but I've never had anything but problems (drive failures, reliability issues)with iomega drives.

Aside from swapping out the enclosures I can only suggest using a folder sync tool to manage the transfer. That way if you do get a dropout the software will be able to pickup where it left off rather than starting from scratch everytime

Thanks for the advice.

Just been looking at the Iomega website and at the hard drive user manual. It says "If you will be using the drive only on Mac OS systems, use a Mac OS Extended (HFS+) format." .
Is this different to Mac OS Extended (Journaled)?
It goes on to say "NOTE: If you want to configure Time Machine to use your Iomega Hard Drive, the drive must be formatted Mac OS Extended."
I'm not using it with Time Machine so should I format it as Mac OS Extended (HFS+)?

Also, the new hard drive is this one. The NTFS drive is a Western Digital My Book, I'm not sure what type of drive it is (SATA etc??). Would this matter?

mrplow said:

I'd have initially thought it was the peak traffic in and out on the USB bus was causing timeouts but if the detection issue remains on restart I'd say it's most likely a hardware/enclosure issue.

It may not be your issue but I've never had anything but problems (drive failures, reliability issues)with iomega drives.

Aside from swapping out the enclosures I can only suggest using a folder sync tool to manage the transfer. That way if you do get a dropout the software will be able to pickup where it left off rather than starting from scratch everytime

Click to expand...

The format in this case shouldn't make any difference

I think I'll try copying to internal HD then copy to new HDD. There might be too much traffic causing the transfer to freeze?

It's another step but yes, that will ease the process to some degree.

I'd still recommend using a sync tool to manage it.

mrplow said:

It's another step but yes, that will ease the process to some degree.

I'd still recommend using a sync tool to manage it.

Click to expand...

Can you recommend any particular software to do this? Thanks for your help BTW

If you're feeling adventurous you can use rsync (with or without automator) - it's part of OSX
rsync + Automator = free and easy backups for your Mac

If not I'd suggested Mac App Store - File Synchronization

mrplow said:

If you're feeling adventurous you can use rsync (with or without automator) - it's part of OSX
rsync + Automator = free and easy backups for your Mac

If not I'd suggested Mac App Store - File Synchronization

Click to expand...

Thanks. I don't know if I'd be confident to try rsync so I'll try File Synchronization first.

The instructions state...
Select Applications - Utilities - Disk Utility.
In the left hand column, click on the drive icon for the Iomega Hard Drive. Make sure you click on the orange drive icon, not the volume icon.
Select the Partition tab.
Select Mac OS Extended (Journaled) from the Format drop-down menu.
Click on the Options button.
Select the type of partition needed for your Mac -
GUID Partition Table for bootability on an Intel-based Macintosh computer.
Apple Partition Map for a PowerPC-based Mac.
Click OK.
Click Partition button. The drive is ready to use when the format completes.

Click to expand...

Yes, that's the way to do it.

OK so after copying some files to my Mac's HD I tried copying them to the new drive but same issue, freezing after a few seconds. I tested copying an existing folder with files on the Mac's HD to the new drive and it copied with no issues.
The issue seems to be with the files that were on the NTFS drive.
Is there any way of changing the NTFS drive to Mac file system and keep all the files intact?

I really don't think it's a file system issue.

It's either the drive itself or the enclosure at fault.
Do you have another enclosure you could use?