HD problem, all files read only

[farmstar]

I first encountered this problem two days ago. I was trying to transfer files to a hard drive on my desktop from and external 80 gig drive to archive to dvd I really did not think to much about it except that i need to get stuff off that drive fast. It happened today when trying to transfer files between computers on a network. all files are doing this.... I got an error message : Cannot create or replace "whatever file.any extension": Access is Denied.
Make sure the disk is not full or write protected and that the file is not currently in use.


Very odd I think. Going to properties, read only is automatically selected, I have not changed any permissions and am running as administrator on windows xp2. when i try to uncheck read only, it comes right back to read only. Any help would be appreciated...I've never had a problem like this

[elmerbumpkin]

this is a longshot, but is the external drive formatted to FAT32 and not NTFS? I know FAT32 can't handle file transfers over 4 gigs or so, I kept getting a "disc full" type message recently on an external drive, and had to reformat. If not, good luck.

[jcrab66]

i think bumpkin may be on to something there, isnt it also true that you can go from fat 32 to ntfs but not the other way? Perhaps that has something to do with it...

[farmstar]

That is a fact, I do have my HD formatted for FAT32 so it would be easier for my older linux box to see it(oof, sould keep with strictly LINUX at this point) .. .i am hoping i can figure out a solution, may have to use my friends Windows 98 or my own LINUX machne to do a pile of cd transfers, or i could put a hardrive in said 98 machine (thinking outloud) ... thanks for the help
and more input encouraged

[Ted]

...isnt it also true that you can go from fat 32 to ntfs but not the other way? Perhaps that has something to do with it...
That is true, but it has nothing to do with transferring files. What you're referring to is when you convert one type of file system to another. You can convert a FAT32 to NTFS, but not the other way around. Files will transfer between the two systems with no problems at all - except of course, the file size limit, as elmerbumpkin sort of touched on. It's a file size limitation, not transfer limitation, though they sort of go hand in hand - when you copy/move, you must be sure the destination file system is able to handle the file size coming from the source.

farmstar - if your destination drive is FAT32 and the source drive is NTFS and the file size is over 4GB, then you will not be able to transfer the file(s). You'll have to format the destination as NTFS. There are tricks to getting Linux to see an NTFS partition, but I'm not sure how it's done. That's something you'll have to Google to learn about.