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Since I could not find a tool that worked for me on my PowerMac G5 (OSX 10.5.8) I wrote a simple app that helps you set-up your Pi OS on SD card. The main difference with other tools is that it:

• Has a GUI
  Is easy to use
  Auto-detect's your SD card
  Helps to protect your system disks and partitions
  Can write all bootable .img images to removable storage
  Is Open Source Under a BSD Licence so it's free as in 'Free Beer'!

Download PiWriter From SourceForge.net

Watch The Instruction Video

Update:

I've picked-up my ApplePi project again which will replace PiWriter/PiCloner in the future and so there have been some updates:

• PiWriter 1.0.4 final has been released
  PiCloner 1.0.4 final has been released
  PiWriter2 initial release introduces drag and drop support and replaces PiCloner
  ApplePi first public development code will be available soon

Updates to PiWriter and PiCloner are mostly cosmetic, the 1.0.4 release will be the final update. PiWriter2 (PiWriter version 2.x) introduces a faster approach by using drag and drop functionality to determine the SD's disk number. It also replaces PiCloner, afther draging a disk icon on the PiWriter window the program will ask you weather to write an image to SD or create a backup image. PiWriter2 allows you to use multi-devices like some USB adapters which are not supported in PiWriter 1.x.

Download PiWriter2 Here

Like ApplePi on Facebook

I recentrly did some updating to PiWriter. The updates fix a bug that might screw-up the wrong disk when using a multi-function device to attach your SD card to your PC. Multi-function devices are devices that have multiple functionalities in one device like a 3G modem, Mobile phone or SD adapters that have multiple cards inserted when you insert it into your PC. This can cause trouble when running PiWriter as admin, the default release of PiWriter does never run as admin so don't worry if you haven't hacked the .app to run as admin yourself.

Also the new PiWriter will open my web page the first time you run it where you can make a donation if you like. It will not bother you more than once...

Up next will be the ApplePi suite which will combine PiWriter, PiCloner and a new interface that will list the most popular OS images for the Pi. A built-in torrent client can download these images for you and while it downloads it will also offer a small amount of your kb's as uploads (if any requests) to the community so you'll help saving the foundation valuable bandwidth and everyone will have faster downloads. The app will also warn you when there are updates so you'll always have the latest version of the images you like available for flashing your SD's.

Thanks for the job.
The cloning part sounds interesting, specially if you are able (like partclone tools) to avoid saving empty space.
I wait for next release

chris57100 wrote:Thanks for the job.
The cloning part sounds interesting, specially if you are able (like partclone tools) to avoid saving empty space.
I wait for next release

Thanx...

PiCloner is just a GUI for good old dd so it only clones entire disks at the moment and it can also slow-down the process even more if you choose to encrypt the end result. I don't think it'll ever be fun to make back-ups but they are quite handy though... Next release I'll see if I can make it a bit more functional and maybe even throw-in some real options and choises. I've heard some good things about dc3dd. It's a dd fork that includes quite some handy extras so I should get familar with it anyways....

I picked up my ApplePi project again which will include PiWriter/PiCloner. Since I thought of a different way to handle the SD detection I made a code re-write that for the time being will be called PiWriter2. This version works slightly different than PiWriter/Cloner.

When you start the PiWriter2 app it will present a console window on which you should drag the desktop icon for your SD card (can be any partition if the device has multiple). PiWriter2 will then ask you if you'd like to write an image to the disk or create a backup image. Depending on your choice it will ask you for an image file for writing or a save location and filename for your backup. That's it!...

Since both approaches have their pro's and con's I'd like to know what approach you like most, the auto-detection wizard or the drag and drop window? If you'd like to test PiWriter2 and post your opinion please also list your skill level for I have a feeling PiWriter2 might be more popular with the more experienced users. (I've added a poll to this thread)

Download PiWriter2 @ SourceForge.net

Like ApplePi on Facebook

I have an sd card and i have formatted it completely (erased) I also know the bsd name. I am trying to open piwriter on my mac osx 10.5.8 and it wont open could i have some help please