What application should I use to open the files on my Western Digital "My Passport for mac"

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56emily Author

Level 1

5 points

What application should I use to open the files on my Western Digital "My Passport for mac"

What application should I use to open files that are on my Western Digital "My Passport for Mac"

Posted on Nov 1, 2013 12:50 PM

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Answer 1

mende1

Level 10

93,538 points

Nov 1, 2013 12:53 PM in response to 56emily

Welcome to Apple Support Communities

You can use the Finder, which comes with Mac OS X > http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2470?viewlocale=en_US

Connect the external drive, open a Finder window and choose the external disk in the Finder sidebar, under "Devices".

You can also make the external drive show up on Desktop. To do it, go to Finder menu (on the menu bar) > Preferences > General, and mark "External drives"

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Answer 2

56emily Author

Level 1

5 points

Nov 1, 2013 12:57 PM in response to mende1

I can find the passport there but if I want to see the files that are backed up there is an option "open with: " but it is blank, and I am not sure what application to put in there so I can open the documents.

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Answer 3

mende1

Level 10

93,538 points

Nov 1, 2013 1:00 PM in response to 56emily

Where do you get the "Open with" option? Also, which application did you use to make backups?

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Answer 4

56emily Author

Level 1

5 points

Nov 1, 2013 1:15 PM in response to mende1

I find my Passport for Mac in the Devices section. If I click on it then I get the option to click again on "backups" and so on till I get to where I double click on the preview. I click preview which should then open up what is actually on the Passport. What comes up is little side bar with various info and one of the options is to open the Passport but I have to tell it what application to use to open all the documents. The space below the "open with" option is blank and I have no idea what to put there so I can preview the documents on the Passport.

I had used the Time Machine originally for backing up but was told to turn it off cause it was just backing up everything and I only wanted files and photos. There was no way to customize the back up so WD told me to turn off time machine and just drag and drop files/etc to the Passport icon.

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Answer 5

mende1

Level 10

93,538 points

Nov 1, 2013 1:18 PM in response to 56emily

You need an application to open the document. Press the document while holding down the Control key and choose Get Info. Then, tell us the extension of the file (it's what you see after the last dot)

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Answer 6

56emily Author

Level 1

5 points

Nov 1, 2013 1:24 PM in response to mende1

Hmmm. it says .inprogress. I stopped the back up.

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Answer 7

mende1

Level 10

93,538 points

Nov 1, 2013 1:24 PM in response to 56emily

.inprogress files are the ones created by Time Machine when a backup is being made. You can't open those files

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Answer 8

56emily Author

Level 1

5 points

Nov 1, 2013 1:33 PM in response to mende1

OK. This is weird cause I turned Time Machine off so it should not be backing up. If I right click the My Passport icon it also has an option for "back up now" so I would assume no back up is happening.

Can I open those files when back up is not being made?

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Answer 9

mende1

Level 10

93,538 points

Nov 1, 2013 1:35 PM in response to 56emily

You can't open them. Moreover, the Back Up Now button tells you that this external drive is chosen as the Time Machine disk.

You should use Time Machine. Although you only need your personal files, it's important to make backups of the whole hard drive, so the task of restoring backups is much easier in case you replaced or erased the hard drive

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