Mac copies files to external hdd twice?

Hey,
Has anyone ever come across a problem like this?.. say if i copy a video file onto my external hdd and plug it into my tv to watch it, it appears twice on the hdd but one of them appears like a broken link and the other is fine... any ideas?

Thanks

How are you copying the files to the external From the Finder or some other program? Also, just out of curiosity:

1. How is the external drive formatted (Mac OS X Extended, NTFS, etc.)? You can find out by right-clicking the drive and choosing Get Info.
2. Does the "broken" file have an _ or . at the beginning of the filename?

Slydude said:

How are you copying the files to the external From the Finder or some other program? Also, just out of curiosity:

1. How is the external drive formatted (Mac OS X Extended, NTFS, etc.)? You can find out by right-clicking the drive and choosing Get Info.
2. Does the "broken" file have an _ or . at the beginning of the filename?

Click to expand...

Files are being copied from my downloads alias that i have placed on my desktop.

My external drive is fat32 as i will need to transfer files from both mac and windows

now that you mention the _ and . strangely enough the broken file has _. at the beginning of the filename.

Thanks

That's called appledouble. It's how older systems used resources and still carries over for some files.
You cant see them but windows (and TV's and Mpeg players) can. Not worth the trouble trying to get rid of them. Just play the ones without the _.

cradom said:

That's called appledouble. It's how older systems used resources and still carries over for some files.
You cant see them but windows (and TV's and Mpeg players) can. Not worth the trouble trying to get rid of them. Just play the ones without the _.

Click to expand...

it's pretty annoying though since this drive could have 100's of video files on it so it will just create a mess

Although I can't think of it offhand, there is a third-party utility that cleans that up automatically for you, and Apple also has instructions ...

Edit: found it in another thread!

http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1629

Isn't that just for DS_Store files?
Here is an explanation of appledouble:Mac OS X v10.6: Using MS-DOS (FAT32)-formatted disks for home directories
And a 'possible' fix? Mac OS X v10.5, 10.6: Finder label changes to files/folders mounted via SMB may not appear to other clients

@cradom and chasm thanks for filling in the details and providing some fixes. I got called away for a bit in the midst of looking for a good explanation of what happens.

@OP if using Terminal gives thou the hives as it does me there is some GUI software out there that supposedly deletes these files and prevents Finder from creating some of them in the future. I have not personally used them but might be able to dig up a name or two.