[twocows]

ok so heres what i did. i'd like to call it a little experiment ...

connected a maxtor 7600rpm drive to a firewire enclosure. launched Disk Utility. clicked on my internal drive. Clicked on RESTORE. dragged my internal drive as the source and dragged the firewire drive as the destination while selecting "Erase Data". so far so good? well i thought so. when everything was over i had a mirror image of my internal drive on the firewire maxtor connected drive.

The firewire connected drive should now boot, right? well i launched system preferences, clicked startup disk and selected the firewire drive and hit restart.

it looked like it was gonna boot but it just sat there at the apple logo and didnt move. i did hear the drive power up and start "Whirring".

What did i do wrong?

help?

[chabig]

Perhaps you simply didn't wait long enough. What kind of Mac do you have?

Chris

[twocows]

Originally Posted by chabig

Perhaps you simply didn't wait long enough. What kind of Mac do you have?

Chris

Machine Model: iBook G4
CPU Type: PowerPC G4 (1.2)
Number Of CPUs: 1
CPU Speed: 1.33 GHz
L2 Cache (per CPU): 512 KB
Memory: 1.25 GB
Bus Speed: 133 MHz
Boot ROM Version: 4.8.7f1

i am pretty sure i waited long enough. i'll try again.

[twocows]

well i waited 10 minutes this time. its just frozen at the apple logo

[chabig]

I asked about the machine because early firewire Macs couldn't boot from the firewire port. Of course your can.

Some external drives won't boot (their controllers don't support it). Maxtor says all of their drives will boot:

http://tinyurl.com/cm4q5
http://tinyurl.com/9jxnz

They also say you cannot boot is the "drive lock" is turned on (I don't know what that is):

http://tinyurl.com/abz7n

You might also see if their is a firmware update for your drive:

http://tinyurl.com/6e44q

A simple test for bootability would be to boot from your OS X install disc, use File > Disk Utility to erase the drive, and install a clean copy of OS X on it. If it doesn't boot, then I'd suggest checking for a firmware update. If there is none, return the drive for replacement. Clearly, Maxtor says the drive should be bootable.

Chris

[amazing]

Download Carbon Copy Cloner from versiontracker.com and use it to clone your HD to the firewire drive. CCC is quick and easy. Report back if your firewire drive will boot at that point. Most likely, some essential system fiddly bit didn't get set correctly in your original setup (this is the highly technical supposition.)

[twocows]

Once again it didnt work.

I used CCC and it was the copy was successful however no luck in booting off of the firewire drive.

I will say that it did get ONE step closer. before it would just show the apple logo and just sit there now i have an apple logo, the little twirling spinning indicator thing below it. yup and thats as far as i got.

perhaps i should mention that the enclosure i am using to tuck my drive into belongs to an LG DVDwriter drive. i dont know how that would matter nor make a difference but it maybe it does.

anyways the whole idea is just starting to annoy me. i just wanted to see if the FW drive was faster than my internal 4200 (Thanks, Apple! ) but even if it was its not like i can drag it around me wherever i go. i'd have to get an internal laptop hd. or not.

[chabig]

I thought you have a retail Maxtor external drive. Your problem, then, is most likely that the bridge board inside your external case either simply isn't bootable or it needs a firmware update. Open System Profiler, choose Firewire in the left column, and tell us who it lists as Manufacturer. Then we can see if there might be a firmware update.

To answer your question, though, a fast firewire drive in an external case will be faster than your internal hard drive.

Crhis

[twocows]

chabig, thanks for the reply. heres the info:

FireWire Bus:

Speed: 400 Mb/sec Speed

GSA-5163D Super Multi DVD Rewriter:

Capacity: 57.27 GB
Manufacturer: HL-DT-ST
Model: GSA-5163D Super Multi DVD Rewriter
Removable Media: No
Detachable Drive: Yes
BSD Name: disk2
OS9 Drivers: No
Speed: 400 Mb/sec Speed
Unit Spec Id: 24734
Firmware Revision:
Unit Software Version: 10483

Mac-Firewire:

Capacity: 57.14 GB
Available: 28.06 GB
Writable: Yes
File System: Journaled HFS+
BSD Name: disk2s3
Mount Point: /Volumes/Mac-Firewire 1

[chabig]

I looked at xlr8yourmac.com for info on this drive. As an optical drive, it is bootable. It's possible that the combination case and hard drive isn't bootable.

One poster said to make sure the drive is jumpered as a master. Try that.

You might also try updating the firmware on the bridge board to A105, which I think is the latest. Here is a link to a Windows-only installer:

http://kenny.storageinfo.co.kr/firmw...63A105(EW).zip

Chris

[twocows]

double post. sorry.

[amazing]

It does indeed sound like the firewire bridge does not support HD booting. The suggestion about setting the HD to Master is worth following up, but after that?

It comes down to how much you think your time is worth. Personally, I'd buy a Macally case from newegg.com or buy.com.

[twocows]

amazing, ya i noticed the HD was set to slave so i jumpered it to master.

I looked at the update link above and then realized that that update is for the CD/DVD drive and it wont do anything for the "Controller" so i'll skip it. besides if i run it it'll ask me to connect the cd/dvd drive which i am not using.

in any case after i set it to master it still didnt boot.

i can mark this experiment as a "FAILURE". no biggy.

thanks for the help!

[chabig]

Sorry. I think we did everything we could.

Chris

[Eriamjh]

I asked about the machine because early firewire Macs couldn't boot from the firewire port. Of course your can.

I take issue this this statement if you are referring to powerbooks because my Pismo could boot to firewire. It even booted to a first-generation, non-911 chipset FW enclosure back in 2001.

I would recopy the drive image to the drive using Carbon Copy Cloner and try again.

I guess it is possible the drive just doesn't support it, though.

[JEBB]

Use Disk Utility's Restore to create the clone on the external drive. Such clones have always worked for me.