new hard drive and file transfer "issue" (errors)

cltaylor12cltaylor12 San Jose, CA
edited January 2005 in Hardware
I purchased a 160MB external drive to use as my home to the mp3's I want to create using iTunes for my iPOD. The external disc would be home to my library and files, and the iPOD would (for obvious space reasons) hold a small portion of it.

However, I found when I tried to format it that I was only given NTFS as an option (not FAT32). I'm finding that I'm getting many Windows Delayed Write Failed messages when copying data onto outside of iTunes, and I found errors one or two times within iTunes when working with files that were already mp3 and were coming from CD-R (rather than a store bought disc).

Does anyone know if these messages are bogus? The files in question seem to have copied over fine, and the size doesn't seem to differ. I also transfered Photoshop files - those were the ones with the most problems; perhaps in the tranfer the color profile data was dumped or something (speculation on my part for lack of know what data could be "lost").

Has anyone experienced this? If so, can you tell me how to perhaps convert to FAT32? I have Partition Magic 8.0 but I don't see the option (it's not letting me select it). I had heard that FAT32 is actually limited and NTFS is the better way to go anyway, so should I not bother?

I don't want to copy all of my music only to find that much of it won't work if the drive can't handle the data or if Windows is messing something up in the transfer. Perhaps it just a read/write "speed" issue?

I'm all over the map here,....Thoughts Anyone?

Comments

  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    edited November 2004
    NTFS is a vastly superior file system to FAT32. No reason to use it. As for your problems, I have no solutions.
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited November 2004
    Okay, first, as thrax said, stick with NTFS. It has nothing to do with your problem.

    What kind of external drive is this? USB? USB2? Firewire?

    I would definitely believe the messages - you are experiencing intermittent connection problems with your external drive and you are suffering from data corruption/data loss as a result. Go to a command prompt and type CHKDSK x: /R (x: being the actual drive letter of your external drive) and watch how many errors it will find.

    We need to figure out why your connection to your drive is sucky.
  • cltaylor12cltaylor12 San Jose, CA
    edited November 2004
    It's USB (I don't know if it's USB 2 or 1.x, I'll have to double check).

    I will do this at home and see what error show up, and repost (later tonight)

    Thank you!
  • cltaylor12cltaylor12 San Jose, CA
    edited December 2004
    The drive is USB 2.0

    I ran CHKDSK m: /R and the window popped up, said what type of file system was on the drive, and than quickly closed.

    Did you mean that I should run it during a transfer of files to see what errors appear?

    Among the files in the transfer where all the Windows error message occured:

    I'm looking at the assorted .jpg and .psd files (in ACDSee because Photoshop is uninstalled at the moment) and I've only found one that has a visible problem (some strange black lines going across an image as if pixels in a row were lost or something); all the others look fine. I opened the .mp3 files (played them) and they seem to play properly (not strange noises, drops, or anything).

    So, I don't understand what happened.

    While moving through the image files though, I did get another error but it referenced a filename I didn't recognize, almost like a temp file name.

    Bizarre.
  • cltaylor12cltaylor12 San Jose, CA
    edited December 2004
    I never found out why the file transfers from Windows File Manager of .psd and .jpg files kept having errors.

    In addition, I'm having a similar problem when using iTunes. So, I ran CHKDSK while iTunes was working, and it wouldn't check the disk while the iTunes process was running.

    So, I clearly have a transfer problem regardless of the file type or the transfer method, and don't know what to do


    The error message (when using iTunes) reads:

    ! Windows - Delayed Write Failed

    Windows was unable to save all the data for the file M:\iTunes\Music\[artist]\[album]\[song].mp3. The data has been lost. This error may be caused by a failure of your computer hardware or network connection. Please try to save this file elsewhere.

    This is a USB drive connected properly and not networked.
  • gibbonslgibbonsl Grand Forks AFB
    edited December 2004
    dose it do that when coping the the C drive?

    also dose the song play ok for the USB drive?
  • cltaylor12cltaylor12 San Jose, CA
    edited December 2004
    No, it doesn't have this problem when copying to c:\.

    Yes, the songs seem to play fine from m:\ , but the process of importing or transferring takes FOREVER with the constant message popping up.

    I got through 8 songs without it today, but it came back.

    I found a setting to apply to the drive in Partitian Magic, in "preferences" that you can select, which I thought would help, but hasn't. The drive is an NTFS drive, and this option "Allow(s) 64K FAT Clusters for Windows NT/2000/XP".

    I suspect selecting that is a step "backwards", probably. I don't know.
  • GrayFoxGrayFox /dev/urandom Member
    edited January 2005
    cltaylor12 wrote:
    The drive is USB 2.0
    cables probably not emi sheilded

    get a better usb cable :p
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