How to format MyBook Live to HFS+

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How to format MyBook Live to HFS+

I purchased two MyBook Lives last year for use back up drives. Since then I've decided to get rid of my PC and switch to Mac.

I want to use Carbon Copy Cloner to create bootable, disk image backups, but it requires the network drive to be formatted to HFS+. It seems Disk Utility requires the network drives to be direct cabled to the computer before it will allow you to reformat them.

Is there a way to directly connect a MyBook Live (ethernet cable only) to my MacBook Air 2011 in order to reformat the drive to HFS to use with Carbon Copy Cloner? Do I need to take it to a friends MacBookPro instead?

Any suggestions or alternative solutions greatly appreciated.

MacBook Air, OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.3)

Posted on Apr 22, 2013 8:35 AM

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Answer 1

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Niel

Level 10

726,749 points

Apr 22, 2013 8:40 AM in response to robtdown

Ethernet drives can only be formatted with a utility specifically designed to work with them and created by the drive's manufacturer; manually putting them in a regular enclosure and formatting them there may cause the original device's hardware to be unable to read it.

(81436)

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Answer 2

robtdown Author

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Apr 25, 2013 6:23 PM in response to Niel

Hi Niel, just to clarify...if I took a MyBook Live and connected it by ethernet to a MacBook Pro or iMac, could I use Disk Utility to create a HFS partition?

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Answer 3

Niel

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726,749 points

Apr 25, 2013 6:37 PM in response to robtdown

No, but you can create a disk image formatted as Mac OS Extended (Journaled) on it.

(81619)

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Answer 4

robtdown Author

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Apr 25, 2013 7:03 PM in response to Niel

Sorry, bit of a mac newbie...creating a disk image is definitely my goal, to do this, do I need to:

format all of the MyBookLive drive as Mac Os Extended (Journaled), or can I
create & format a partition of the MyBookLive drive as Mac Os Extended (Journaled), or
could Carbon Copy Cloner just create a disk image on the MyBookLive with whatever its current formatting is?

Thanks for your time on this!

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Answer 5

Niel

Level 10

726,749 points

Apr 25, 2013 7:05 PM in response to robtdown

Just create a disk image. The drive as a whole can't be reformatted or repartitioned except as noted above.

(81621)

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