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Lion External Hard Drive (and flash drive) problem

I recently installed Mac OS X Lion on my Macbook Pro. I plugged in my external hard drive and my computer recognized the HD and even let me access files on it. However, when I tried to copy a movie onto it, it gave me an error: "The operation can’t be completed because an unexpected error occurred (error code -8003)." I decided to try a different file, the same thing happenned. I tried a USB flash drive and the same thing happenned. I checked the permissions for them and it says "you can read and write" so everything is fine there. If it helps the HD is formatted as "MS-DOS (FAT32)" and the USB stick is "MS-DOS (FAT16)".


I don't really know what to do because I have never had this problem on the same computer with Snow Leopard in the past (the only time I did was when the file was too big to copy onto it because of the formatting or something but it definetely isn't the case now).


PLEASE HELP!

MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.7)

Posted on Jul 26, 2011 12:07 PM

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Posted on Jul 31, 2011 5:23 PM

I have had a similar problem. When I insert a flash drive to USB under Lion, it will not mount if formatted in MS-DOS, although it will show up in Disk Utility. A flash formatted in NTFS will mount, but I cannot drag files to it, making it useless.


This seems to be a bug in Lion.

8 replies

Aug 1, 2011 4:40 AM in response to etresoft

When I had the original problem it was absolutely any file (no weird names). If I tried copying a movie it wouldn't work, if I tried copying a photo it wouldn't work, if I tried any small file it would not work.


After about an hour the problem fixed itself and I was able to copy anything.


Now my computer stopped recognizing my HD when I plugged it in. However, after a bit of time this problem fixed itself too.


Very weird.

Aug 2, 2011 11:56 AM in response to russiansergey19

Try resetting your PRAM. I had the same problem and it worked for me.


- Shut down your mac

- Start it back up, you will hear a chime

- Before you see the gray screen press: cmd+option(alt)+p+r

- The computer will restart again and you will hear the chime a second time

- Release the keys if you heard a second chime

- Let your computer startup

- Your problem is fixed!


more info on resetting PRAM: http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1379

Aug 12, 2011 6:30 PM in response to deathride007

PRAM reset does not solve the problem of being prevented from changing permissions for accessing my external hard drive.


All of my music, movies, etc., is stored on this drive.


As a result of the problem, I cannot sync my ipad or my two iphones to my new Macbook Air.


Do we just need to wait for a bug fix?


Pity. I just made the leap from WIndows to Mac for the first time. What a disappointment.

Aug 15, 2011 11:02 PM in response to mjmsup

There might be a bug in the driver of the FAT-32 files systems. That is the likely cause, resolution, go for any free FAT-32 filesystem driver for mac. There is very less security feaures in FAT-32, and I am sure that the security messsagae is a red herring.
What you can possibly do is a unmount, and then a remount, manually.
[http://groups.google.com/group/comp.sys.mac/browse_thread/thread/875f76b02ae664c 5/5ec5b8769922a29f?pli=1]

Please keep us posted. Sorry that you are disappointed. A leap is a leap is a leap, 😟 which always requires struggling... don't worry, it would fall in place.

Lion External Hard Drive (and flash drive) problem

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