Snow Leopard and Lion on external hard drive

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Level 1

16 points

Snow Leopard and Lion on external hard drive

I successfully installed Snow Leopard on an external hard drive in one of the partitions. I am also able to boot from the Snow Leopard on the partition, access the internet, get my email and have successfully installed Evernote. I am also able to access Apple Store and needed items on my laptop.I am using a MacBook Pro as the laptop so it starts up with Snow Leopard from the external drive and I can still access my original info because I used Super Duper to clone my hard drive (running 10.5.11). My question is when I access email and the internet when Snow Leopard is booting does that change the settings on my MacBook Pro. All was fine for a couple of days but today I was unable to access the Internet or get my email when I booted from 10.5.8 on my laptop. (The external drive was not connected.) I was able to figure out what to do to get everything working again but I'm not sure I could repeat it. So, if I boot from an external drive does that change the settings on the laptop? If so is there a standard way to change things back. I did make screen shots of the settings on my laptop once I got it working again.

Thanks.

Nancy

MacBookPro, Mac OS X (10.5.8)

Posted on Aug 29, 2011 10:57 AM

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Answer 1

ds store

Level 7

30,725 points

Aug 29, 2011 11:10 AM in response to Nancy Bley1

Far as the network and internet is concerned your running two different machines.

If you make a change to your email settings and that's saved at the web or ISP, that will show up on the other OS when you access that account.

If your using your ISP's email instad of web based email like Gmail or Yahoo Mail, that could account for the problems.

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Answer 2

Linc Davis

Level 10

209,547 points

Aug 29, 2011 11:11 AM in response to Nancy Bley1

So, if I boot from an external drive does that change the settings on the laptop?

No.

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Answer 3

Nancy Bley1 Author

Level 1

16 points

Aug 29, 2011 11:32 AM in response to ds store

I made no changes that I am aware of anywhere. I simply booted from the external drive, used my docs, etc., set up Mail using the same settings on the laptop that runs 10.5.8 and accessed the Internet using Safari. Once finished, I shut down and disconnected the external drive. When I turned on my laptop the next day I had to reset the network settings in order to access everything. Is there something else to know before I boot up again with the Snow Leopard external HD? Thanks for helping.

Nancy

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Answer 4

X423424X

Level 6

14,265 points

Aug 29, 2011 12:59 PM in response to Nancy Bley1

Unless you are using the same common home directory for running both versions of the OS (which is possible) then when booting from two distinct volumes, and it doesn't matter where they are, doing something on one does not affect the other.

You have two home directories, one on each volume. You are using the one on whichever volume you booted from. So if you defined your mail settings on each exactly the same way (pop, smtp, etc) I would expect them to behave the same way. Similarly for the network settings.

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Answer 5

Nancy Bley1 Author

Level 1

16 points

Aug 29, 2011 1:39 PM in response to X423424X

Thanks. I'll check that I did define them exactly the same and try again. Your explanation was clear enough for me to understand.

Nancy

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