[Old Thread] How Do I Store Library On A Portable Harddrive?

[cmarshall]

I have been using Calibre on my desktop for several weeks now -- no problem!

But here's what I want to do that is proving more complicated. I want to be able to access my library on my netbook too. But I want to put my Calibre library on the portable USB hard drive I just bought and make that the ONE library that I access from both my desktop and my netbook. The goal is to just be able to plug my portable USB hard drive into whichever computer I'm using and have that computer read from the library folder on the portable hard drive. That way I won't have to screw around with syncing or transferring files back and forth (I annotate my documents as I read them and don't want to lose annotations).

That's my theory but so far I haven't been able to get my netbook to read the library off the portable hard drive. I first copied the Calibre library folder (containing 9 gig of files and growing) onto the portable hard drive. Then I plugged the portable hard drive into the netbook and tried to point Calibre at the folder on the portable hard drive. But no luck.

First it failed and said something about failing to write to a read only database. So I checked the property of the Calibre library folder on the portable hard drive and it was read only. I think I was getting off on the wrong track but for the hell of it I unchecked the radio button that made the Calibre library folder read only and made it and all of its contents not read only.

But that didn't help. The I uninstalled the Calibre that was already on my netbook and reinstalled and tried to get it to start using the library on the portable hard drive from the get go -- but that failed too.

Is there a way to do this?

[cmarshall]

After I posted the above post, I found the instructions about setting up portable USB drives. I followed the directions but that failed too. It doesn't like the database location, the database gets corrupt, its read-only, etc etc

[cmarshall]

I've uninstalled and reinstalled 3 or 4 times but it seem sit doesn't completely uninstall as it keeps looking for a corrupted database after I reinstall without me telling to look for one anywhere

[HarryT]

I have my Calibre library on an external USB disk. No problems at all. It's a good idea to use Windows "Disk Administrator" (if you're on a Windows machine) to change the drive letter to a high value so it will always mount as the same drive letter - I have mine mounted as drive "L:" (for "Library").

[Sweetpea]

I have mine on my external HD as well, without any problems. But I created it from scratch on that location.

It sounds as if your copying goes wrong, because I did the same as you did (only from my external HD to my network drive at home) and it worked without any problems...

[cmarshall]

I never got it to run using the instructions on how to install on a USB stick but I got it working using the CalibrePortable App.

Warning to anyone else who tries this you have to do 2 things first:

1) install C++ runtime on the portable hard drive
2) make sure the security settings on the portable hard drive allow it to be written to

[HarryT]

I'm a little confused. In your initial post you asked about putting your Calibre LIBRARY onto a USB drive. Now you seem to talking about installing the Calibre application itself onto the USB drive. Which is it?

[cmarshall]

At first I was trying to run Calibre software from my desktop/netbook but have the library each used sitting on my USB drive. But I couldn't get this to work using Calibre.

However, in the user's manual they refer to an application called CalibrePortable which I was able to get working. That application actually resides on the USB drive. So the way I am set up now, I use the desktop/netbook to launch CalibrePortable but that means looking at the USB drive and launching it from there. It seems to be working quite well.

One other tip: make sure your power saver settings don't have your USB drive nodding out every 5 minutes -- that crashes Calibre.

[HarryT]

I understand now. Thanks for the clarification. As I said, I have my Calibre library on an external USB drive and it works absolutely fine - never had a problem with it at all.

[PPH]

I know this thread is old, but I had the same problem. I copied the library from the external drive to the notebook's drive, and then it worked. So, it would seem that, in some cases, the same library will work if it's in the computer's drive, but won't if it's in an external drive. If I discover something else, I will post it here.

[PPH]

Running Calibre as administrator ("Run as administrator") will do the trick. I'm guessing this only happens with recent versions of Windows (Windows Vista, Windows 7).

[theducks]

Originally Posted by PPH

I know this thread is old, but I had the same problem. I copied the library from the external drive to the notebook's drive, and then it worked. So, it would seem that, in some cases, the same library will work if it's in the computer's drive, but won't if it's in an external drive. If I discover something else, I will post it here.

You need to lock the drive letter ( pick a letter well above the built in drives (LMNOPQ). Stay away from the top letters that are used in some networks)

If your drive letter changes, Calibre can't find the Library without help.

[PPH]

Thank you, theducks. Actually I made it work without doing that (I always plug the external drive in the same place, so I haven't had problems with the drive letter yet).

Like I said, what does the trick is running Calibre as administrator. Still, this causes a new problem: drag and drop of ebooks stops working. It happened to me, and I saw in another thread that that was the problem. I can live without drag and drop, but I thought I'd mention it because it's a collateral effect of the solution.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by PPH

Thank you, theducks. Actually I made it work without doing that (I always plug the external drive in the same place, so I haven't had problems with the drive letter yet).

Like I said, what does the trick is running Calibre as administrator. Still, this causes a new problem: drag and drop of ebooks stops working. It happened to me, and I saw in another thread that that was the problem. I can live without drag and drop, but I thought I'd mention it because it's a collateral effect of the solution.

It is not the USB port that assigns the letter, but the combination of port and drive availability ('Speermint': plug in a thumb drive AND another drive, then Boot). Most of the time, you do get the same letter. If you only have 1 external drive (and your device is NOT a drive) you will get the same letter.
Thumb drives, Card (reader) drives, External HD,CD and my readers. All can (and have) been attached in various combinations. If you do it now, you won't forget later (and panic) when Calibre can't find the Library because a letter shifted.

[PPH]

You're right. Thank you.