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File sharing from PC to Mac - help!!!!

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221b | 13:53 Sat 13th Jan 2007 | Computers
10 Answers
I'm tearing my hair out while trying to 'file transfer' from my old PC to my Mac.

I've got an ethernet cable and tried that at first, yet, the Mac doesn't seem to recognise that the PCs connected to it via the ethernet cable.

Then I've tried additionally connecting the PC to the router that I use to connect the Mac to the internet.

To set up file sharing on the PC, I've gone to My Computer, Folder Options, View etc but no opportunity to select 'Simple File Sharing' appears, though I'm told it should.

I was given to understand that the Mac will just detect everything for you, but this simply isn't happening!! How does this happen?

I've gone to Finder, Network on the Mac where I expected to find an icon for the PC to open and start copying, but nothing's there!!

HELP please!

I HAVE to do this today as I've promised to give my PC to someone as a gift and they are about to drive 6 hours away without it if I can't work it out. Also, I don't want to be beaten by something that by all accounts is really easy ;-)

btw...

In addition, I even bought a memory stick to transfer from the PC to the Mac, but it came with no instructions as to how to do it, what to do first etc so I feel a failure on all counts!

All detailed guidance gratefully received!!

221b
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Microsoft uses a bit of a weird protocol for sharing resources on a network, and macs don't like it greatly (neither do other non-Windows machines).

I had some difficulty when I was setting it up too. The Apple support site has some stuff on this, and after some messing (manually entering the windows machine's IP address, workgroup name, etc.), I got it working. But even then it didn't work that well.

In the end I used my external hard drive (or your memory stick should suffice). Just plug it into the windows machine, copy files you want onto it, then plug it into your mac and copy the files across. As long as the memory stick is formatted in FAT32 (most sticks will be like this by default), both can read and write to it.
Question Author
Thanks fo3nix

After I posted yesterday, I eventually finished at 3.45 am this morning by having to do it with 2x 2GB memory sticks leapfrogging each other.

One thing I found with the memory sticks is each time I used them, then wiped them clean, they were still registering as having space taken up on them and eventually I had only about 465KB free on a 2GB stick, even though I'd wiped it clean and there were no itmes stored on it.

Any suggestions?
How were you wiping them clean? Formatting them?
Question Author
I was opening the Kingston 'E' drive page, selecting all the files that I'd just copied from the stick to teh Mac and then deleting them so as it read 0 files.

At first it seemed to return to teh 2 GB each time and then after a few goes, the space left on teh sticks seemed to diminish quite rapidly even though there were 0 items on it.

Bizarre...
In windows, right-click the drive, then click 'format'. You'll then be able to quickly format the drive, back to the original 2GB.
Question Author
Err....

I've only got the Mac now as I gave the PC to my parents this afternoon and they are now 300 miles away....

Is there a way I can format it via the Mac? I'm guessing there must be?

Thanks for your help so far!

221b
Yes, goto the applications folder, then the utilities folder, and open disk utility. you can then choose the 2GB drive and then click the erase tab, choose the ms-dos file format, and press erase.
Question Author
Excellent!

All done...

How on earth did you know that?

Ps me off that the info is nowhere on the Kingston website...

Thanks v much.

221b
I'm a mac fan :)
Dropbox.. it's easy to share anything with anyone for free if you don't want large amounts of storage. Just install dropbox to both computers using the same email address and 'voila"

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