I have two external hard drives, my older Maxtor 5000DV 160GB unit and the newer LinkStation 250GB unit I got about a year ago. Until recently, the Maxtor was my main backup drive. I got the LinkStation mainly to work as a network print server, so that I could have one printer available to any computer in the house. It works beautifully in that role. You plug your printer into the front USB slot, and away you go after making a few more easy changes.
About a month ago, I’ve began using the LinkStation as my main backup drive. It made more sense to consolidate data from the various computers into one central location. That also got me to try making use of the rear USB, where you can plug-in an external USB drive. I added my Maxtor drive, so that I could see what was on it from any computer in our home network.
Again, this worked beautifully until this weekend. Then for the first time, I tried to write to the Maxtor drive. Frustratingly, I kept getting “Access Denied” or “Cannot copy…Access is denied. Make sure the disk is not full or write-protected and that the file is not currently in use” error messages.
I tried various things, including reading the manual. Then I hit the Buffalo support site. Answer found. Yep, you can read what’s on an external drive no problem, just by plugging it in. But if you want to write to it, the drive has to be formatted by the LinkStation itself — something not mentioned in the manual.
What a pain. Still, it’s easy enough to do. One added plus is that the LinkServer can then automatically backup any key folders to the Maxtor.
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Hey,
I have been pulling my hair out with this one, so pleased to discover your site. The link you suggested to the manual is broken so just to help out.
In the admin panel go to system>storage which will list the drives and then format the drive from there.
Solved a problem I have been thinking about for days!
Best
Joe