2 questions.. 1 about usb stick, 1 about camera to mac, HELP!

[teforla]

first of all WHY DIDN'T I DISCOVERED THIS SITE BEFOREHAND!?!? this is going straight into my bookmarks.

ok, my crappy argos-catalogue 1gb usb stick is full already yet it doesnt have anything on it. can i format it? where?!

and

i'm trying to get a video from a sony miniDV digital handycam onto my mac via usb cord but it's not appearing. i need the video on my computer so i can edit it in After Effects or iMovie(if i figure out how to use it..)

please help, it's for my art project which is important as i'm in my final year at uni. ARGH

thank you in advance




p.s. bonus question... is disk utility alright to use to backup my photos, music, documents, & even applications? thank you!!

 

[MisterMe]

..., my crappy argos-catalogue 1gb usb stick is full already yet it doesnt have anything on it. can i format it? where?!

Yes, you can format the flash drive, but is that what you really want? It seems obvious that the drive cannot be full if it has nothing on it. If you have used this USB stick and moved files to the Trash, then those files are probably still there. With the drive mounted on the Desktop, empty the Trash.

If you still want to format the drive, then you can do that with Disk Utility. Launch DU and then select the Erase tab. You will then see a pop-up menu with various file system options.

i'm trying to get a video from a sony miniDV digital handycam onto my mac via usb cord ....

Have you tried FireWire?

 

[symphonix]

It seems obvious that the drive cannot be full if it has nothing on it.

On a side note, if the USB key has a write-protect switch (about half of them do), then make sure that you've turned it to write-enable.

As for the camera question, you really need a Firewire cable. This is also sometimes called iLink by Sony, or IEEE1394. Get one with the mini-plug for your camera on one end and the larger plug for your firewire jack at the other end. From there, iMovie and After Effects should be able to see the camera fine.