Sharing an external firewire HD between 2 computers

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Level 1

15 points

Sharing an external firewire HD between 2 computers

Just wondering if there is an easy way to share an external firewire HD between my home mac mini and my ibook?

At the moment I can get it to either mount on one or the other but not both at the same time.

Thanks in advance.

Posted on Oct 6, 2005 2:43 PM

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Answer 1

Oct 7, 2005 7:36 AM in response to iYann

I don't believe there is any way to use 2 firewire cables. If you network the 2 computers, you can attach to 1 and use "sharepoints" to share the external drive over the network. Just search for sharepoints and you'll find the link.

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Answer 2

Oct 7, 2005 10:39 AM in response to Alan Thiel

The short answer is 'no'

I have attempted to explain a bit below.

Although the FireWire standard does support this kind of use, the problem lies with the management of which files are open and which aren't.

That kind of management is the sort of thing that xSan does. It allows several computers, or servers to access the same files, on a disk. (Last I checked, it was priced at $999 per computer.)

xSan only works on FibreChannel devices, such as the Xserve RAID, so it's not going to be the solution in this case.
(The RAID hardware also supports capabilities far beyond what you can expect to benefit from in a normal FireWire hard disk.)

In effect, it's the bridge chip and other circuits in the FireWire hard drive that have the most important limitation.

I am not sure exactly how the FireWire implementation of this capability is supposed to work, but I suspect it requires additional capabilities both in the FireWire drivers, and the hardware that controls the hard disk.

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Answer 3

Chris A.

Level 2

225 points

Oct 10, 2005 2:42 PM in response to Erik Haugan

Yes, you can. I just answered this in another thread, and this is the way I have our computers set up at the office.
It's just a sharing issue.

I have an iMac G5 with a FireWire HD. In the other room, a G3. In order for the G3 to access the FWHD, it must have Admin. access.
On the Mac where the ext. drive is connected, go to Sys. Prefs & make sure the other user (G3) is Admin.
Then, Get Info on the ext. drive. Make sure that Ownership & Perm. are Read & Write, and under Details, Access and Others is also Read & Write.
I do beleive that the key is the Admin. access, though. Without that, the G3 does not even see the connected FWHD.

Make sure File Sharing is ON. Then, you would just 'Connect to Server' from one to the other. You could even log in to the host as its owner.

hope that helps

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