external HD problems

vallaha@hotmail · Oct 11, 2007

i just bought an external HD 160 G's usb2 for my imac. there supposed to be an icon on my desk top telling me it is connected but there is no icon. in the manual it says that a blue light on the HD tells you that there is power running through it but it cannot read infomation, data files etc. there is a blue light. it isn't powered by an external powersource but from the imac itself.

something about formatting? does that make sense to you? please help

cwa107 · Oct 11, 2007

vallaha@hotmail said:
i just bought an external HD 160 G's usb2 for my imac. there supposed to be an icon on my desk top telling me it is connected but there is no icon. in the manual it says that a blue light on the HD tells you that there is power running through it but it cannot read infomation, data files etc. there is a blue light. it isn't powered by an external powersource but from the imac itself.

something about formatting? does that make sense to you? please help

Yes, you will need to format the hard disk if it doesn't come formatted for Mac from the factory. You can do this by opening Disk Utility (Applications => Utilities folder), selecting the Hard Disk from the list and then clicking the Erase tab and choosing a format (I would recommend "Mac OS Extended - Journaled" if you're only using the drive with a Mac, choose "MS-DOS" if you're sharing with a Windows machines). Then click Erase.

vallaha@hotmail · Oct 11, 2007

hi

thanx for advice but theres a problem. the volume format drop down menu is blanked out. any more advice will be appreciated

cheers

raptorkid700 · Oct 11, 2007

is it a windows ony hd?

cwa107 · Oct 11, 2007

raptorkid700 said:
is it a windows ony hd?

There's no such thing. It might have a Windows partition (NTFS), but one can remove that partition.

cwa107 · Oct 11, 2007

vallaha@hotmail said:
hi

thanx for advice but theres a problem. the volume format drop down menu is blanked out. any more advice will be appreciated

cheers

Make sure you have the drive selected in the left window pane.

This article should give you a more thorough explanation of the process.

vallaha@hotmail · Oct 12, 2007

no its osx aswell

vallaha@hotmail · Oct 12, 2007

cheers, it works.