Welcome to the MacNN Forums.

Wayland · Feb 28, 2009, 12:22 AM

I have an ipod touch gen 1 and want to use it as a flash drive. Which one is better? I hope to use it on both my ibook g4 and toshiba laptop at work running xp. I can't really tell which one is easier to set up on both operating systems.

Mac User #001 · Feb 28, 2009, 03:41 AM

I don't know if it's just a problem on my end or not, but I have Air Sharing and have never been able to move very large files with it. Never. Just something you may want to look in to.

JKT · Feb 28, 2009, 04:00 AM

If you have MobileMe, then MobileFiles Pro is better than both and makes your iDisk useful (it also has the best support for viewing .xls files on the iPhone at the moment, including vesus dedicated spreadsheet apps). Even if you don't have MobileMe, it still works as a Bonjour Flash Drive. MacWorld recently had a review of it. There is also a free version to use with MobileMe only (iirc).

Simon · Feb 28, 2009, 04:17 AM

I use File Magnet. It's easy to use and it gets the job done.

But beware that you won't be able to view very large files (for example a 3 MB PDF). The iPhone simply doesn't have enough RAM. Of course if you're only going to use it as a 'flash drive' and not to view the documents this won't be a problem for you.

Wayland · Feb 28, 2009, 11:04 PM

Do you mean 3gb pdf file? 3 mb is not really that big.

I am leaning towards file magnet anyway. I like that you don't have to play with network settings. On the other hand, I need windows support, and I think air sharing is better.

chabig · Feb 28, 2009, 11:24 PM

He means megabytes. I think there is a problem with the way FileMagnet displays pdfs, but it does choke on moderately sized ones.

Simon · Mar 1, 2009, 03:54 AM

3 MB isn't big. But if the entire system has only 256 MB RAM the PDF display doesn't get that much. This isn't just a FileMagnet problem. FileMagnet uses the built-in frameworks for file display and that's where the iPhone's RAM problem comes in. If I get that same large PDF as an email attachment I can't view it either.

Wayland · Mar 4, 2009, 04:54 PM

I decided on Air Sharing. So far so good, on both Mac and Windows. I have had no problems with pdf's much larger than 3 mb.

Rumor · Mar 8, 2009, 06:13 PM

I lucked out and got Air Sharing when it was free. However, the first I tried to load files onto another computer, it didn't work wirelessly. Now I look back on it, it was because the wired machine was using a different network. Does AS actually work like a USB drive with info being retrieved via Explorer/Finder?

Mac User #001 · Mar 9, 2009, 02:08 AM

Sorta. It's more like a wireless hard drive. But yes, you use Explorer/Finder to access files.

goMac · Mar 9, 2009, 03:48 PM

Air Sharing is my app of choice.

wilsonng · Mar 10, 2009, 06:13 AM

Originally Posted by Mac User #001

I don't know if it's just a problem on my end or not, but I have Air Sharing and have never been able to move very large files with it. Never. Just something you may want to look in to.

I have Air Sharing as well and couldn't seem to get a stable wifi connection between my Leopard Mac and Air Sharing.

It turns out that when I create a network on my Mac, I had set it to automatic channel. Later I decided to choose a channel and it worked perfectly for my bigger file transfers.