[Jeff Carpenter]

I personally like Seagate, but you can find people who say they like other brands more.

As for size, that’s totally up to you. I will say that I don’t max out the size of my boot drives because I have no reason to. Everything works faster if your files are on drives 2, 3, and 4, so that’s where I keep my stuff. (Even my iTunes Library has been moved there.) I use the boot drive for Applications and their support files and not much else.

So something in the 300 – 500 GB range is good. That’s more than I need, usually, but it’s good to have a little room to grow, just in case.

But again, that’s just me. If you can think of uses for a 1 TB boot drive, there’s no problem with that.

Besides the obvious (SATA, 7200 rpm) the one thing I would be sure to look for is the drive’s cache size. There are drives with either 8, 16, or 32 MB caches built in. That’s not usually something they put in big letters on the front of the box, so be sure to research that before you buy. It’s usually on the box somewhere in small print. If an online store doesn’t list that info, buy from somewhere else. I know http://www.compusa.com is one site that lists that number.

[Jeff Carpenter]

Export the file from Final Cut as a self-contained quicktime movie. Then, close Final Cut and drag that file into Compressor.

This goes a little faster than exporting directly from Final Cut to compressor. When you export directly, Compressor goes in and looks at things like titles and transitions and spends more time on those areas. This take a little more time than if you just give it a single file to work on.

This means that this method is technically not quite the same quality as a direct export, but I haven’t really been able to see much difference in the past.

I don’t suggest this much any more, because on newer machines the time savings are not as noticable. But for you, it could make a real difference in the time it takes.

[Jeff Carpenter]

The only way to do it without file limitations is to use the Macintosh format (HFS+) on the drive.

Then, buy this program for any PC you want to read the drive on:

https://www.mediafour.com/products/macdrive/

[Jeff Carpenter]

I believe the limit is 16. After that you could buy another firewire PCI card and more there.

That being said, I agree with Shane. You should probably be looking in eSATA units with an eSATA card to connect to it.

[Jeff Carpenter]

I just thought of one more thing. My last post explains how it works, but there’s one thing that might throw you off.

Sometimes I get an error message that Time Machine has run out of space. (Perhaps you got this alrady which is why we’re here?)

Just ignore it. It’s some kind of bug where it’s telling you something you don’t need to know. Yes, sometimes Time Machine will run out of space while trying to copy files. This is not YOUR problem, though! Eventually it works around and figures out which old files to erase and it gets on with its life and everyone is happy.

So there’s no reason it SHOULD tell you that, but sometimes it does. Just say ‘ok’ or ‘cancel’ or whatever it wants to hear. I see it from time to time too, but after an hour or so it’s worked itself out.

I just wanted to point this out because that message seems to contridict what I’ve told you already. Don’t worry, it’s fine. It’s just bothering you with a notice that it really should just keep to itself.

[Jeff Carpenter]

No, I guess I didn’t make it very clear.

Time Machine is designed to opperate with the drive full. That’s the way it’s supposed to work.

The size simply equals how far BACK you can go. This is a simple example:

Let’s say you have 100 GB of data on your computer. A 100 GB Time-Machine drive would be 100% full and give you access to 1 backup copy of everything you own.

A 200 GB drive would be 100% full and give you access to the last 2 copies of everything.

A 1 TB drive would be 100% full and give you access to the last 10 copies of everything you own.

And so on. So it doesn’t matter what size drive you have, it will ALWAYS fill up. And that’s ok. You’ll just be able to go further back in time with a bigger drive, but a smaller one will still work.

The point is that, in all of these examples, the drive fills up all the way. You don’t have to do anything about it, just let it do its thing.

As for your specific case, I’d suggest starting over. Since you’ve been moving stuff around there’s no way to know what’s going on. Use Disk Utitility to re-format the drive (HFS+) and then set it up as a time Machine drive again and let it backup overnight. Might as well get a totally fresh start.

[Jeff Carpenter]

You mean Time Machine, right? You shouldn’t worry about erasing the files. It’s supposed to fill up the drive, that’s how it works.

[Jeff Carpenter]

There are some programs, but from what I’ve seen they’re mostly geared towards solving problems. In other words, if the system is slow or unreliable in some way, there are programs to help you track down and fix these problems.

Disk Warrior is one of the important ones, actually.

For actual maintenance, there’s not a whole lot to do. Here’s a general ‘to-do’ list, but there’s no one program than does these things.

1) Run ‘Software Update’ in the Apple-menu once a week or so.

2) Don’t let your drive fill up more than 80%.

3) IF you have strange problems, launch Disk Utility and try the ‘Repair Disk’ and ‘Repair Disk Permissions’ features. This is only after you have a problem, though. I see no reason to do these things on a regular basis.

4) If you use iPhoto, once a year or so, launch it by holding COMMAND-ALT and clicking the icon. It will start-up in a mode that lets you re-build the thumbnail icons and library directory. This can help speed up iPhoto if you have thousands of photos.

The bottom line is, there’s not much you need to worry about. I’m sure others here can give you a few hints, but they’ll probably be small stuff, just like my list here.

[Jeff Carpenter]

Yes, make a Photoshop document with transpart parts. It can be any size, but I suggest working at the icon’s default 512×512 size, just so you know what you’re going to get.

Save the file as a Photoshop document.

Then, get this free program:
https://www.shinyfrog.net/it/software/img2icns/

Yes, the page isn’t in English, but the “Download” button is. Trust me, it works fine and is super-easy. Just open the application and drag the Photoshop file right onto it. That’s it. It make it into an icon file.

You found the “Paste” feature in “Get info” already. Now you do the same thing to this icon, but “Copy” it from “Get info.” Then paste it in the ‘Get info’ of the file you want to change.

[Jeff Carpenter]

We need to know where this is going. To DVD, DV tape, or the web? And after that, will it play as true 16:9 or is it going to be letterboxed within a 4:3 frame?

There are simple answers, but they differ slightly for each of those scenarios.