Accessing Optical Drives In Older Mac By Newmac

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nealt

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I have a MacPro 3.1with 4 hd and 2 optical drives. I want to move to a new iMac. I know I can access the hds by ethernet but apparently not the optical drives even though they are set for sharing. Target disk mode is not possible due to interface differences.
So ideally I would like to be able to use software on the new mac to read and write to these optical drives. Besides moving the drives to a new enclosure is there any way to do this? I just hate to put the MacPro to waste.
 
hmm... How do you know target disk mode not work on your MacPro?
A new iMac won't do target disk mode in the same way, but only one Mac needs it, your MacPro - where it should work.
You don't get access to empty drives in target disk mode, so leave a CD/DVD in the drive when you boot to target disk mode. That will provide your "access", as the CD/DVD should mount on the iMac's desktop.
 
I want to access the optical drives because new macs do not have them. Why waste my MacPro which has 2 optical drives and 4 hard drives?
 
Sounds good.
Boot the MacPro to Target disk mode.
Connect with firewire to the newer Mac. You will need a Thunderbolt to firewire adapter for the new iMac.
If a disk is inserted in the optical drive, it should appear on the desktop of the newer Mac.

Or (even simpler) remove one of the optical drives from the MacPro, and install that in an external enclosure.
OWC sells those, too. https://eshop.macsales.com/item/OWC/MR3UKIT/
 
@nealt Yes, the second option is better and simpler.
There is no point in hitting the first tip.
The same thing I did yesterday.Work fine.For me!

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Last edited:
nealt said:
How about connecting the two computers via a wired router?
Click to expand...
But, in your first post - you said that doesn't work?

Better option, I think is to remove one of the two optical drives, and put that in an external enclosure. USB 3 will be a good choice for that.
All you need is an ATA interface for the enclosure - unless one or both of the drives have been changed to SATA drives. ATA was standard on the MacPro3,1 - but SATA is available on your Mac Pro logic board, and of course, SATA will be easier to find for an external enclosure.
 
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