error code -36

This sounds like the same problem you'd encounter trying to get over 120 GB to transfer to a Mac OS 9 formatted hard disk:

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=86178

My suggestion therefore would be to format the hard drive for Mac OS X, and use http://www.mediafour.com/ Macdrive to read the drive on Windows machines or format the drive NTFS and use http://code.google.com/p/macfuse/ to have read/write access to it.

Mind you, only a Mac OS X formatted drive will with certainty be bootable on a Mac Pro.

Error -36 means Input/output error.

i've been having the same issue and have looked all over
the net and found no solutions. it would appear that the
finder is in some way broken. the transfers don't fail at
the same places when you retry. i did have some success
using the command line (cp -Rpv from to). this allowed
me to copy the files, however, they appeared on the
target drive as unix executables rather than quicktime
mov files and nothing i've tried has allowed them to play.
i've never had issues like this with either linux or windows
and would love a solution but in something like two solid
weeks of searching i haven't had any luck. there are posts
out there, mostly older, referring to this issue in regard
to samba shares as well as firewire drives. my experience
has included neither so it's apparently a broader problem
than that.

BabaG

This behavior is starting to sounds like the drive that is invisible is actually either broke in the drive mechanism or the interface to the drive. Try connecting the drive to another computer to see if it is one or the other.

Afraid I don't know RAIDs too well, so any advice I give you might be faulty.

A couple of thoughts.

1) File size limits for FAT32 are 4GB. Any files larger than that will cause trouble.

2) Your RAID is a lot faster than a USB 2 external drive.

Try copying smaller amounts of files that you KNOW are smaller than 4GB.

Also, try only connecting the USB hard drive to the Mac and not the keyboard ports, which are not USB 2 unless you're using a new iMac. (unless you're already doing this)

Scott

Details, please:

What is the disc format of the RAID ? HFS ? Fat-32 ? Amiga-DOS ?

Why are you using a Mac to write to an MS-DOS disc ? This could be part of the problem. Can you copy files to your Mac ?

You are copying 180 Gb of video, right ? In one file ? in 180 little 1 Gb files ? How is it split up ?

I think you need to rule out problems on the destination drive before you get too involved with the RAID Volume.

As for getting it to mount, ask Disk Utility for more information about it.

When you say initialize, but do not explicitly ask for "Zero All Data" only the first about 1000 blocks, where the directory will be placed, are actually re-written. If you are getting I/O errors, you need to be certain that your destination drive is error-free, by initializing with "Zero all Data" option. This process will take several hours, and you cannot allow your Mac to go to sleep during the process.

When it completes, the drive will have substituted spare blocks for any that could not hold the test pattern without error, and your disk will be "factory fresh" again.

Then if you get errors, they are more likely to be caused by the source.

RAID 0 (striped) combines two drives into one logical Volume. It can have speed advantages in Writing -- by filling the write buffer on one drive, then filling the write buffer on the other drive.

If you are using two IDE/ATA drives, and have them both on the same cable, the write speed-up is small, and the read speed-up is non-existent. The IDE/ATA protocol allows NO overlapped I/O on a single cable. If you visit sites like MacGurus where folks are posting their RAID transfer speeds, the top speeds are when the two IDE/ATA drives are on two separate cables, or when they are SCSI drives (because SCSI controllers and drives do allow overlapped I/O).

These articles provide some more background:

106594- Mac OS X, Mac OS X Server: How to Use Apple-Supplied RAID Software

58636- Final Cut Pro: What Kind of Hard Drive Should I Buy?

Message was edited by: Grant Bennet-Alder

I've got a new MBP and a new WD Mybook 500GB USB 2.0 drive. I've also installed Boot Camp with XP Pro on the Mac (not the Mybook). The Mybook is FAT32 formatted.

Whenever I try to copy about 150 MB or more from the Macintosh HD, I get error 36. I can read just fine, I just can't copy more than 150 MB at a time, whether as a single file or multiple files.

If I boot into XP, the Mybook works perfectly. I can move or copy as much as I want. I've copied more than 100 GB in a single go. It works perfectly on several other XP machines to which I've connected it.

Disk Utility reports no errors.

Any thoughts?

Welcome to Apple Discussions!

Please start a new topic thread here:

http://discussions.apple.com/forum.jspa?forumID=751&start=0

As you have a different problem from the original poster, and you can get more focussed attention for your problem if you start your own thread.

hi i was having the same exact problem with my WD 500 gig drive. i tried a bunch of stuff but what finally work was so simple. i didnt reformat or anything! i took my drive to my pc to try to see if it would do the same thing there. i opened the properties and decided to defrag it and run the check disk on it. it took forever but it worked. now i can copy video files from my mac to my WD. give it a try. youve got nothing to lose!

good luck and hope this helps,
deedee ^_^

Hi,

I'm trying to install Propellerhead's REASON program and getting the following message:

The Finder cannot complete the operation because some data in "Reason" could not be read or written. (Error code - 36)

Please forward any info. with regard to this quite annoying issue...

Thanks,

Raymond