Bottlehead Forum

Other Gear => Digital => Topic started by: aragorn723 on October 17, 2015, 10:59:20 AM

Title: running out of hard drive space
Post by: aragorn723 on October 17, 2015, 10:59:20 AM

Hi,

I have an older macbook and am running out of hard drive space.  It is backed up with a Western Digital My Passport, is it possible to play music directly off of that?  Thanks,

Dave

Title: Re: running out of hard drive space
Post by: kgoss on October 17, 2015, 11:09:03 AM

It should be no problem. Just point your playback software to the music files on your external hard drive. I have been using an old laptop with a USB hard drive and JRiver for a long time with no issues.

Title: Re: running out of hard drive space
Post by: mcandmar on October 17, 2015, 11:47:32 AM

Please remember that external hard drives, and laptop internal drives (same thing) are notoriously unreliable.  i.e. spend the $50 on another drive to make a backup copy of your music.

I speak from experience as i lost my entire music collection recently due to a failed hard drive and had no backup. Slightly embarrassing for me being an IT Manager :-[

Title: Re: running out of hard drive space
Post by: aragorn723 on October 17, 2015, 03:53:25 PM

That worked, thanks :)  nothing like finding a solution without spending any $.  Guess i'll have to buy another to be the backup :)

Title: Re: running out of hard drive space
Post by: rif on October 17, 2015, 04:20:10 PM

If mcandmar is implying that laptop/typical external drives are unreliable.  I believe they make external USB enclosures that can handle a normal size desktop drive.  It's been awhile since I was in the game, however.

Title: Re: running out of hard drive space
Post by: kgoss on October 18, 2015, 05:05:47 AM

It really doesn't matter. Laptop, desktop, or external drive. They will all fail eventually so a backup is the answer. Personally, I have my stuff (music, pictures, videos, etc) on three separate drives. That way when one fails I have two good backups.

Title: Re: running out of hard drive space
Post by: Paul Birkeland on October 18, 2015, 06:49:30 AM

Get something like this:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817707337&cm_re=raid_enclosure-_-17-707-337-_-Product (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817707337&cm_re=raid_enclosure-_-17-707-337-_-Product)

Set it up for raid 1 with a big pair of HD's.  If one dies, you pull it out and replace it, then the raid controller recopies all the data on the remaining drive back onto the new one.