Oh no! More boring computer problems! Oh no!

steeeeeeevie, come to Bed-Stuy!

Yeah the mp3s and m4a's will be fine on the new FAT32 drive xp

Okay! Ty ty ty I would hate to lose my Strawberry Switchblade cover of "Jolene" that I've had for over a decade.

laurel yeah, the tricky thing about the file system is that the files themselves remain intact, it's just that they sit on the hard drive differently

OH OH OH I know!!! Think of it like GETTING NEW BOOKSHELVES: Books are like files and the bookshelf is the file system, and when you switch file systems, you have to take allllll the books off and bring in the new bookshelf and put all the books back on, but the books themselves remain exactly the same, and if you took the books off and put them on your friends bookshelves, the book would not change at all. It would just be sitting on a different bookshelf.

STEVIE D I LOVE YOU SO MUCH I am filled with squee by your explanation for an old lady.

but you can't just get new bookshelves on top of the old ones, you HAVE to take all the books off first before you can put them on the new one (i.e. you have to remove all your files from the drive before you format it, and then you put the files back on).

Also, the bookshelves do exactly the same thing: the books sit there. That's it. Some bookshelves fit into some rooms better than others and maybe there are some slight aesthetic differences (don't overthink it) and some shelves are wider than others etc etc but all they do is hold the books, that's it!

yo I am rly excited to have this new bookshelf metaphor to take to take to work for my customers; we are big on metaphors and real-talk at our desk bcz our whole angle is "friendly happy polite user-friendly help desk that makes you smile and not hate the help desk"

NB you should have (at least) two copies of all your files, on different disks, for safety. hardware dies.

I back up some things to the external once in a while, files I want to archive somewhere OFF the laptop. But the 30GB of music just has to live in one place, I don't have space for more than that.

As it is, I've moved it from a home computer to 3 different work computers over 10 years at the company, and back to home when I stopped working there, and iTunes already gets the flu and "loses" files all the time, and then when I try to reload them, DUPLICATES them so I don't know which is which. Basically I have no music management system at all.

how would you extend the bookshelf metaphor to the FAT32, NTFS, etc. issue?

Trying to put files > 4GB on a FAT32 drive is like trying to put vinyl record sleeves on your standard sized Ikea bookshelf

Or your TASCHEN or w/e humongo art books

Or trying to put a lot of books on an Ikea bookshelf -- it just can't hold that many without falling apart

Things fall apart, the file allocation table cannot hold

sarah idk bcz there are two factors with each file system: reading and writing. Mac can READ NTFS (like it can see the files on it, it can open the files, it can play the music, etc) but it cannot WRITE to it (so you cannot save files, you cannot change the track names in iTunes, etc). It's completely one-way.

I guess like idk different bookshelves fit in different rooms better than others? And the one that fits in every room universally has shelves that are too small and can't fit your records or your TASCHEN books.

I tried to copy some old files from some DVD-Rs that were 10+ years old maybe and like half the shit was corrupted :(

Uh wait I just looked at my files and I have plenty of mp3s that are over 4GB. Like, LOTS.

I MEAN MB, NOT GB. Sorry.

Wait okay, I misread. SORRY.

and there's this hot new bookshelf on the scene (that's actually been around for a while at this point...) that is supposed to fit in all of the rooms, it's DESIGNED to fit in all of the rooms, but a lot of room designers are like "ugh no we don't really want that" which defeats the purpose, but it can hold yr TASCHEN books and your acid house 12"s and there's no reason not to buy this bookshelf

this is just getting weird and convoluted i think

xp fyi 1 GB = 1000 MB

I like topics where if you use the wrong word or are slightly unclear, the listener or reader can still get your drift. Things where meaning depends on absolute accuracy from character to character make me really flustered. Like, say, ALL OF MATH.

isn't it 1024 though?

1000 on the Mac 1024 on PCs

i mean yes but ssshhh, the gist of it is 1000

So the 4 GB file limitation on FAT32 means on a Mac the limitation is actually 4.096 GBs ; )

DAYO STOP

:D

and compression is like those library shelving systems with the sliding racks, where you can't just go in and grab the book, you have to crank the wheel so that it opens to the shelf you want?

I know the difference, it's just that in mind one character being read/remembered wrong shouldn't make the whole statement false. But it does. But I think I'm okay now. So...how do I reformat this HD now that everything is duped to a folder on my desktop?

Applications -> Utilites folder -> Disk Utility

Then: http://support.apple.com/kb/PH5819

Ignore the part about ExFAT, just select MS-DOS (FAT)

they've changed so many basic things for Macs in the past 10 years or so, (since the last one I own that still works was made) that it makes me wonder if I could even do the things I used to know how to do on one. :/

and compression is like those library shelving systems with the sliding racks, where you can't just go in and grab the book, you have to crank the wheel so that it opens to the shelf you want?

― sarahell, Saturday, October 25, 2014 5:09 PM (8 minutes ago) Bookmark

Yeah this is good

Okay but the size of the disk is over 32 GB. It will be okay anyway?

yes, you can ignore that.

the 32 in fat32 does not refer to any disk size limit. It will be okay.

I think the 32 GB is a thing leftover from Windows XP days; it should

But you should definitely check by formatting it then unplugging it and replugging it into your router to see if it recognizes it + sees how big it is

I'm like 95% certain that it should be okay

oh yeah well i'm like 97% or 98% certain

YAAAAAAY NOW IT SEES THE HD AS HAVING 931 GB CAPACITY. I have no idea why 1 TB just turned into 931 GB but whatever, I don't need HALF of that anyway.

I am 100% certain, but I am a PC user, so that might just be like 97% for Macs

Okay uh now how do I put things in it?

Because the router settings page recognizes it but doesn't tell me how to drop files in, ie I don't see a button or link or anything. And it doesn't show up in my Finder tree anywhere as a location.

Unplug the drive from the router and replug it to the MBA and transfer file sthat way

But my computer won't recognize it anymore now that's it's formatted for Windows, I would have thought? I'll try, hang on....

Dumping the HD folder back on.

The thing about FAT32 is now it will be recognized by EVERYTHING :D

your new shelving system will fit in any apartment!