Moving files from PC to Mac

My query is if I connect the drive to the Mac can I open each file one by one, copy each one I want then delete the files that I copy or do not want, or will the Mac only read and copy, not delete?

I read I can also connect by ethernet cable to the PC (not sure if i need direct cable or crossover cable), would that be better? Would that give me the editing ability I want? (i.e. view copy and delete).

As a last question - having had HDD failures in the past - hence the set up on the pc - duplicated on the Mac (I don´t use the Macs internal HDD, files and OS are on the external drive), can I rely on Time Machine to keep my data safe, or would I be safer reformatting one of the other external HDDs and having that as a second backup controlled by a third party software? If so what do you recommend?

Thanks

Yes you can, it will take forever but sure you can do that if you want to.

Use the Ethernet connection, ensure the PC and Mac are on the same network.

Time Machine is one form of backing up your Mac. However when it comes to backing up, redundancy is very very wise, as you mentioned HD's fail and that means backup HD's fail too. Get another EHD, purchase a clone app such as SuperDuper or Carbon Copy Cloner and in addition, created a bootable clone along with using Time Machine. That way if one backup fails (don't laugh, it happens all the time) you have another backup to restore files from.

By the way, remember OS X will read a NTFS HD however it will not natively write to it. So you can copy the files from the NTFS drive to your Mac, however the Mac will not write to it. There are utilities that allow this to work, that being said, IMHO they are unreliable therefore are poor solutions.

Your welcome, please mark this thread as solved. This may help other users.