which is preferable, MacDrive or HFSExplorere?

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Level 1

8 points

which is preferable, MacDrive or HFSExplorere?

I have a new MacBook Pro with Snow Leopard and I have created a Bootcamp partition and installed Windows 7 successfully. Everything works except that I cannot open files from the Mac partition unless I first copy them to the Windows partition. I understand that I cannot edit files and write them back to the Mac partition but would like to be able to do things like open pdf files or play music files without making duplicate copies of everything. I understand that either MacDrive ($50) or HFSExplorer (Free, but with fewer capabilities) will make this possible. Does anyone have a recommendation either way? I don't mind paying for MacDrive if it is much better and will allow me to do things I can't do in HFSExplorer, I'm just trying to figure out what makes the most sense. I suppose I could use the trial version of MacDrive and then try HFSExplorer but thought I would ask the question first and see what suggestions come back.

MacBook Pro, Windows 7

Posted on Nov 28, 2009 1:57 PM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

Side_Step_Society

Level 2

439 points

Nov 28, 2009 6:04 PM in response to am11

I'm using Snow Leopard and Windows 7 and I can open/read all the files on my Mac partition. Boot Camp 3 drivers included a driver to be able to read (read-only) files from a Mac partition.

I've never used HFSExplorer, but I have used MacDrive. However, one thing about MacDrive is, it allows full read and write access to your drive, so, if you enable full read and write, you're going to have all those messy Windows files stored onto your Mac partition. Now, most of these files won't make a difference on your Mac partition, but knowing they're there bugs me. 😝

However, if you choose to enable read-only in MacDrive, you'll notice you may have a hard time using any files that are stored on your Mac partition in Windows.

With the driver that is included in Boot Camp, you get full read privileges and everything seems to open nicely in Windows. I added all my documents, MP3's, videos and pictures to my Windows "Library" and all of them open/play just fine. Also, since it's read-only, you don't get the messy Windows files saved onto your Mac partition.

Do you perhaps have a trial version of MacDrive or HFSExplorer installed? It may interfere with the Boot Camp driver.

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Answer 2

Nov 29, 2009 1:34 PM in response to am11

Hmm... well, what I'd suggest you do is try the MacDrive trial, see if that fixes your problem, which I'm fairly certain it will, and then you can get a better idea of what you want.

Basically, if you don't mind Windows creating files like, "desktop.ini" or "thumbs.db" or whatever else on your Mac partition, MacDrive and its ability to Read/Write is for you.

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Answer 3

am11 Author

Level 1

8 points

Nov 28, 2009 2:40 PM in response to am11

One other thing I just noticed - Windows 7 has a feature called Library which allows it to connect to folders on any partition on the MacBook. It turns out I can open files with Windows software as long as I add them to a library, which basically measn that it's not necessary to copy the originals from one partition to another. I'm still interested in whether either MacDrive or HSFExplorer gives me any additional capabiities but this seems to solve my immediate problem.

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Answer 4

am11 Author

Level 1

8 points

Nov 28, 2009 6:31 PM in response to Side_Step_Society

Thanks for the quick response. I haven't installed trial versions of either HFSEplorer or MacDrive. At first I thought I could open anything that was attached to a library in Windows 7 but then next time I tried I found that I got errors on trying to open those same files. Of course I can open any of the windows files from Snow Leopard so one option may be to keep original copies on the Windows partition. (By the way, music files are accessible without difficulty.) I find if I copy files to the Public Documents folder, I can open them - but I think in that case I am actually copying them rather than just linking them.

I guess it might be worth seeing whether for some reason the relevant Boot Camp driver needs to be installed again? Everything on this machine is brand new in the last two weeks so it would be my assumption that it should be pretty much up to date...

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Answer 5

am11 Author

Level 1

8 points

Nov 29, 2009 8:30 AM in response to Side_Step_Society

Pretty standard files - Microsoft Word and Excel files and Acrobat pdf files. And I have versions of all three programs installed on both the Windows and the Macintosh partitions and can open files in those formats if they are in the right directories.

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Answer 6

Nov 29, 2009 3:07 AM in response to am11

Hmmm... What type of files are you having trouble opening?

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Answer 7

am11 Author

Level 1

8 points

Dec 3, 2009 5:30 AM in response to Side_Step_Society

thanks, I'll give that a try...

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