How to Turn Your Mac into a FireWire Hard Drive for Quick Data Transfer

In the PC world when you want to transfer data directly from one computer to another, you would use a network, or maybe even attach the computers using a crossover cable. This would give you a maximum transfer speed of 100mbps. But what happens if you're transferring gigantic media files or other data that total well into the gigabytes? The transfer could take hours. Fortunately, Apple takes direct data transfer to the next level using the computer's own built-in FireWire ports. By putting a Mac into what's called "Target Mode" and attaching it to another Mac with a FireWire cable, you allow that Mac to appear as a FireWire hard drive on the other Mac's desktop. This gives you a whopping 480Mbps of data transfer!

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Things You’ll Need:

• Two Apple Macintosh Computers running Mac 8.6 or later with at least one FireWire port each
• FireWire cable

1. Shut Down the computer you want to use as a FireWire drive, but don't connect the FireWire cable yet.
2. Turn that computer on again and hold down the "T" key as it boots up. If the computer boots into the operating system, then you did not hit "T" fast enough. Shut down the computer and try again.
   
   You will know you are in Target Mode when you see an orange FireWire symbol on your monitor. Once you see the symbol, you can let go of the "T."
3. Switch on the second computer.
4. Using any standard FireWire cable, hook the two computers up to each other using their FireWire ports. Order isn't important.
5. Open the finder of the second computer. The other computer's hard drive(s) should appear in the finder.
6. Move your data from one computer to another just as if you were using an external hard drive.
7. Eject the drive(s) of the computer in Target Mode when you're finished transferring your data. You can right-click the drives and select "Eject" or drag and drop the icons into the Trash.
8. Disconnect the FireWire cable.
9. Shut Down the Target Mode computer by holding down its power button until it shuts off.
10. Hit the power button one more time to turn the computer back on and boot up into its operating system normally.

Tips & Warnings

• ADVANCED USE: Target Mode can be used for much more than just data transfer. The drives of the Mac in target mode can be repaired, erased and reformatted all from the other Mac. You can also install OSX directly to those drives just as if it was a native drive. This is actually a popular trick for people attempting to install newer versions of OSX on older Macs.