A bad operating system is one of the greatest cause of the issue of macbook air showing a flashing question mark on startup when you start the computer. The system profiler or system information may provide additional information regarding what media your computer supports. The original macbook air has been out for a while now but it is still an amazing piece of technology. The apple usb superdrive is compatible with mac models from 2008 and later that dont have a builtin optical drive. Os x automatically decides which drive to store the file on depending on how much you use it. It connects to your mac with a single usb typea cable thats built into the superdrive. The macbook air superdrive has unique firmware which prevents it from being properly recognized as a plug and play optical usb drive by windows. Can i run my macbook air purely from an external hard drive.
If you buy a new external hard drive, you may notice that working between mac and pc is an often. The next step would be to launch the disk utility application located in the applicationsutilities folder, click on the optical drive called superdrive in disk utility, and then click. How to install software from a cddvd to a macbook air. In disk utility select your macs internal drive, making sure to click on the drive and not the volume beneath it. If this fails, then you will need to reinstall your operating system. May 10, 2019 a bad operating system is one of the greatest cause of the issue of macbook air showing a flashing question mark on startup when you start the computer. In disk utility select your mac s internal drive, making sure to click on the drive and not the volume beneath it. Now, with these new mac devices such as macbook pro, you are not able to run cds or dvds, that is why the users of the latest mac devices now completely rely on external cd dvd drives. How to pick a startup disk for your mac at boot time. Then check the copied data of the macbook air ssd on the destination drive. The best external hard drives for mac in 2020 pcmag. Mar 31, 2020 use disk utility to erase your startup disk and any other internal hard disk select your drives name from the left side list and click the erase in the format menu, choose mac os extended journaled or apfs, type a new name for your disk we recommend the default name macintosh hd and click erase. When you wake your mac up, for whatever reason, your external drive does not wake up.
Just remove the screws from the bottom of the macbook air s case, then remove the screw holding the ssd in place. How to share an external hard drive between mac and windows. This video will show you how to upgrade or replace your macbook air s hard drive. Macbook, macbook air and macbook pro models with usbc ports require a usbc to usb adapter sold separately to use apple usb superdrive. Tired of having to use shared drive with networked windows pc for every need of using a cd dvd drive on my macbook air 2008 purchased 1. So i went to mac os utilities and went to disk and accidentally deleted my 3tb hard drive.
How to format external disk for macbook a apple community. Common macbook air problems and solutions 2020 updated. Any external hard drive will work with pcs or macs, as long as the connectors are there firewire, usb, etc. Buy the apple usb superdrive disk drive right away. Apr 18, 2020 select your startup disk, then click the arrow under its icon, or press return. For one, its practically the same as apples superdrive in every way. Everything you need to know about your macs hard drive. Unfortunately, if youve got a newer model, youre probably out of luck. Compatible with macbook pro with retina display and macbook air. Before doing something as drastic as replacing a macbook air s ssd, it pays to confirm the drive is actually damaged and unrepairable. So, it does not work with the apple computer that i own. The computer has two separate drives, but you only see it as one.
The 11inch early 2015 macbook air models macbookair7,1 also use the same pcie 2. The macbook air forgoes the optical drive to keep it thin and small. How to reformat my hard drive using my macbook air quora. Im looking for a way to take out the ssd out of the unit and be able to read it externally on a mac. Heres what you need to know, along with our toprated applefriendly drives. It helps to verify and repair a range of issues related to startup hd and external drive problems. Apple no longer sells a mac with a cd drive macrumors. Initially, i was convinced the hard drive ssd was dead. The ssd removed from a 20102011 model will not fit into 2012 or 20current year enclosure and vice versa. Open the disk utility app and highlight your external hard drive. If the optical drive is visible then the system is communicating with the drive. If youve recently upgraded to a new imac or macbook pro, youre probably going to need an optical drive if you want to continue importing your movies and music to itunes, or just access the content on your discs.
Youll never have to worry about lost cables with the apple usb superdrive. Macbook air models a1237 and a4 hard drive replacement. If you have a newer mac and a usb drive that supports usb 3. How to connect external hard drive to macbook pro wikihow. May 16, 2016 you can unpair a tardisk, but the process requires restoring your macbook from a time machine backup youve stored on a separate external hard drive. The disc should then be available on any mac thats connected to the same network. So you have to resort to one of the following means to get your programs installed. On your macbook air, within the remote disc window, doubleclick on the name of the mac that has the media drive. On the mac that doesnt have an optical drive, open a finder window. Later on, apple didnt continue to manufacture macbook and imac with optical drives in 2016 and the middle of 2011.
Click the raid type popup menu to specify the type of raid that you need. The format process can take up to several hours depending upon the drive size. Get the best external hard drives for macs in 2020, and expand your macs storage without paying a premium. If you think youll need an external drive mostly for bluray discs, most. How to upgrade macbook air hard drive original20082009. You have two different apple applications finder and disk utility reporting two different data amounts. Aug 24, 2015 a startup disk is a partition of a drive or a volume that contains a usable operating system.
Disk utility raid controls on your macbook dummies. Oct 27, 2016 apple has discontinued its nonretina legacy macbook pro, the last mac it sold with a builtin cddvd drive. Get help with the slotloading superdrive on your mac. From the raid tab of disk utility, click and drag the disks from the list at the left to the disk box at the right. How to upgrade your macbook air with more storage imore. Choosing this can speed up your hard drive performance by splitting data between multiple disks. Asus powerful bluray drive with 16x writing speed and usb 3. Feb 23, 2015 installing the new drive is actually quite simple. Sometimes drive not appear on the desktop, then you should check for a disk in the left frame of finder windows and under the devices heading. Click on copy now button then this disk cloning software will clone the macbook air ssd to the destination drive.
Feb 08, 2020 how to partition an external hard drive on mac. If you need to reformat the disk, follow the steps in this tutorial. How to partition a mac hard drive, ssd or create an apfs. Best external hard drives for macs in 2020 techradar. Check external disc or usb drive storage space on mac using disk utility. There are several reasons why your mac wont recognize a drive. It doesnt matter how the drive is formatted out of the box, since you can reformat any way you like. Note that you can buy any cd or dvd with maximum data storage capacity and then transfer your data from one computer to another. Apparently there is a nonecable connector that allows the unit to be recognizable by macs, but without a cable attaching the drive to any mac. Use the arrow keys to select which drive to boot from and then simply press enter. Most modern mac laptops except for the macbook air have a dvdr drive, which makes it easy to send up to 8. For example, your mac can boot directly into windows if youre using boot camp. Read the old ssd out of unit and use as external drive. Connect the macbook air superdrive directly to the computers usb port instead a usb hub.
Select remote disc in the devices section of the sidebar. If youre using a compatible disc and you dont see it from remote disc, make sure the sharing computer is turned on, is connected to the same network as your mac, and has a. However, there are a couple of workarounds if you really need a cd or dvd drive. Here are the best mac hard drives and external storage options in. Aug 28, 2012 external usb hard drives are lightweight, portable and inexpensive. If you have a disk already mounted and your system goes to sleep, it also powers down ports, including usb ports. To put it simply, the fusion drive is a mixture of both a solid sate and a hard disk drive. Formatting in hfs mac os extended or fat32 or ntfs3g can be done with the mac os x disk utility.
However when you find that your mac doesnt recognize external hard drive then different thoughts come in mind like the drive is corrupted or crashed. If you think youll need an external drive mostly for bluray discs, most of them will also play dvds and cds but are not readablewritable. Id recommend storing the screws from the bottom of the macbook air in a small cup or plastic storage container so they don. Insert a disc in the optical drive of the computer thats being shared. If you are able to fix the hard drive or ssd in your mac or an external drive using disk utility you will hopefully be able to recover your files. Highlight your drive and click partition in disk utility. Do i really need a macspecific external hard drive. If you want to create multiple partitions on your external hard drive in fact, you should for better file organization, heres a stepbystep guide. I am an engineer and have clients with dead units and i am guessing the the data on the ssd would be fine no way of. Find low everyday prices and buy online for delivery or instore pickup. I have since done extensive research learning that if you do not own an macbook air or have skills beyond the basic computer wizard that i am this device is useless. External hard drives, thumb drives, usb drives, flash memory cards, and devices like ipod are examples of storage devices that you can connect to your mac. No one wants to box up an expensive external hard drive or even a usb flash drive to transport 4gb worth of photos to aunt martha.
Preprogrammed for both mac and windows, you shouldnt need to do any formatting to get the drive to work. This drive would not mount on two separate macbook pros although it said it was compatible with with apple osx. One more representative of the best cd and dvd drives is apple usb superdrive. Having this external drive you will be able to play and burn cds as well as dvds, create backup discs and install program software. Aug, 2019 the 11inch early 2015 macbook air models macbookair7,1 also use the same pcie 2.
Keeping mac os and data on separate drives macworld. How to select a different startup disk apple support. These days macos keeps your data in your home folder, or even in icloud, so its a far less common scenario. How to use macbook air superdrive dvd drive on windows pcs. Run apples disk utility and try to repair the disk. As first noted by anandtech, the original macbook air models the macbook air core 2 duo 1.
Tips to fix mac doesnt recognize external hard drive on. Prepare your drive you can store your library on an external storage device, such as a usb or thunderbolt drive formatted as apfs or mac os extended journaled. Historically, the most common was to separate the macs system files from the volume on which data was stored. At one time keeping your home folder on a drive other than the one used to start up your mac was something of a black art. Remote disc allows the optical drive of a nearby mac to be borrowed for use in mounting discs on the macbook air. With no eject button on the device and powered by usb the visiontech external cddvd drive is very slim and compact. In this case to fix the issue, first, try booting off an os cd. First, you can use apples remote disc option to install programs. When software comes on a cd or dvd and you want to install it on a macbook air, you cant just pop open the disc drive or slide a disc into a slot, like you would on a computer with an optical drive.
Since yesterday my mac will boot and then shut down. If i booted from a recovery usb, disk utility would not even find the drive. Use external storage devices with mac apple support. About six months ago, my macbook air started having a strange issue where it would often not be able to find the startup disk, giving me the flashing question mark. Open disk utility and check what format is being used. Install, boot, and run mac os x from an external hard drive. No one wants to box up an expensive external hard drive or even a usb flash drive. Slide the new one into place, then reverse the procedure. Double your macbooks storage with a tiny card called tardisk. If your mac already has a builtin optical drive, or an external optical drive connected, you wont see the remote disc feature appear in the finder or other apps. How to access files on failed macbook air inside my laptop. If you guy, want to check your external memory storage devices like usb pen drive, external hard drive, etc.
Go to disk utility erase disk select erase with journaling. Then you could boot off your rescue usb disk and have your data saved on another external drive. Normally, the technique for replacing a damaged directory is to reformat the drive, but that erases all the data thats already. Maxone 2tb ultra slim portable external hard drive hdd usb 3. Youve already tried power cycling your system which didnt resolve the issue. Its portable design is great for mobile workstation.
How to factory reset a macbook air or other mac with macos. D i am a long time pc user who has just got a macair. Macbook, macbook air, and macbook pro models with usbc ports require a usbc to usb adapter sold separately to use apple usb superdrive. The 8 best external hard drives and ssds for mac and pc users in. Select it and youll see any macs on your local network that have a media drive.
The inch notebook had not been updated since june 2012, but it remained available for. Heres a method of at least cloning your boot disk from discussions. They are great for backing up data, creating extra storage space on your computer and transferring large amounts of data between two or more computers. Steps 46 are optional but should be used on a drive that has never been formatted before, if the format type is not mac os extended, if the partition scheme has been changed, or if a different operating system not os x has been installed on the drive. Meanwhile, imacs, mac pros, mac minis, and the entrylevel macbook air all still. On your macbook air, open a finder window and look for the remote disc entry under the devices heading. Scroll through the list and locate the external drive you plan on using to install windows.
How to cope with just 128gb of ssd storage on your mac mini or macbook. This drive is easily compatible with macbook pro with retina display, macbook air, imac late 2012 and later, mac mini late 2009 and later, and mac pro late 20 devices. Use the cd or dvd drive from another computer with your mac. If you press and hold the control key during this step, your selection is saved in startup disk preferences, so it persists until you change it. I accidentally deleted my mac hard drive and my mac wont. Nov 01, 2019 for smooth, hasslefree, fast, and secure transmission of your data, external cddvd drive is the best solution for your mac. How to format or partition an external hard drive for mac. Ssds installed in macbook air 20102011, macbook air 2012 and macbook air 20201420152017 models are different, even though they look similar. Before you start, you need to make sure the external drive you are using is formatted for mac os extended journaled. Fusion drive is a feature apple introduced with the new imac released late this year. The likely cause is catalogdirectory damage, not a damaged os. Theres no separate power adapter, and it works whether your mac is plugged in or running on battery power.
If the one in your macbook air isnt working properly right now, you will need to format and install the operating system on the external using someone elses computer, but. Jun 19, 2016 yes, you absolutely can boot your macbook air from an external hard drive. Restoring your mac to factory setting implies that you are ready to format hard format your macintosh hdd startup disk and remove all of its content, installed applications, widgets, and the userdefined settings so that the macbook pro is rolled back to its original state. You can tuck it away anywhere that makes the most sense for you. Then i wanted to get a fresh copy of yosemite and it is asking me to choose a disk, there is no disk to choose. Ensure your drive can read the specific type of disc being used. Now its more likely that youll partition a drive in order to run multiple operating systems. Compatibility issues between microsofts windows and apples macos have diminished. The two primary options for reading cds and dvds on a macbook air are to either purchase an external superdrive or to use an apple feature called remote disc. How to create a partition on your mac to install macos. Apparently, i did not understand that this apple macbook air superdrive mc684zma does not play nice with imac computers. Get an 8gb usb stick and format it for a boot disk partition it with guid option and mac os x extended journaled. If your mac is more than a few years old, you can almost certainly upgrade the hard drive.