Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

AriGold

macrumors member
Original poster
Oct 13, 2010
92
1
After doing a fresh install of yosemite on my MBP, my external hard drive is now 'read only' and cannot copy files to it.

Any ideas on what has changed and what I can do to fix the problem. I cannot format the drive as all my files are on it.
 

dZp

macrumors 6502a
Mar 29, 2006
987
55
  • Select the disk and choose File > Get Info.
  • Click the disclosure triangle next to Sharing & Permissions to expand that section.
  • Select the “Ignore ownership on this volume” checkbox.
 

AriGold

macrumors member
Original poster
Oct 13, 2010
92
1
It says 'You can only read' only.

There are no other options etc.
 

dZp

macrumors 6502a
Mar 29, 2006
987
55
Can't you change the "Privilege" to "Read & Write" for yourself?
 

AriGold

macrumors member
Original poster
Oct 13, 2010
92
1
No. It just says what i posted above. permissions in disk utility are greyed out also.
 

AriGold

macrumors member
Original poster
Oct 13, 2010
92
1
23w31g9.png
 

chown33

Moderator
Staff member
Aug 9, 2009
10,999
8,887
A sea of green

It's read-only because the disk format is NTFS. You can see this in the Format item under the General heading: "Windows NT File System (NTFS)"

OS X can read NTFS by default, but not write it.

"What changed" is that you had an extension that provided read/write capability, and that extension doesn't work in Yosemite, or it was removed by your fresh install.

There are several different products that provide this capability. We can only guess which one you used.
 

AriGold

macrumors member
Original poster
Oct 13, 2010
92
1
It's read-only because the disk format is NTFS. You can see this in the Format item under the General heading: "Windows NT File System (NTFS)"

OS X can read NTFS by default, but not write it.

"What changed" is that you had an extension that provided read/write capability, and that extension doesn't work in Yosemite, or it was removed by your fresh install.

There are several different products that provide this capability. We can only guess which one you used.

Ok thanks. I honestly don't remember if I had something installed which allowed me to read/write. Is there a common one I could try?

I will have a research and see if I can find something.
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.