What formatting type should I use for my external hard drive?

best external hard drive format for mac image

dj5826

I currently have an external hard drive formatted with NTFS for my PC. I will most likely be purchasing a Mac soon and would like the hard drive to work on both the PC and Mac. What is the best formatting option for this?

Answer
FAT32. Except, use a third party tool to format it. Youll usually get much better performance if you use a third party tool.

How do I reformat an external hard drive from a Mac to Windows 7, without a Mac?

Ty

I used to have a Mac desktop and laptop, so both of my external hard drives were formatted accordingly. I now have a Toshiba Satellite that runs on Windows 7. I am not able to view either of my external hard drives on my Toshiba - what do I do to change this? Thank you, in advance.

Answer
Does your windows 7 computer identify the devices? It may still identify the devices just not let you view the content of them because they are in a different format. If so take note of the drive letters and go into CMD and type "format drive:x" or something similar. Once it has formatted you should be able to import it as a foreign disk in Disk Management or simply now use it with your windows pc.

Let me know if this helps as im not sure how else it can be done without a mac.

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How to get data from an external hard drive formatted for a mac onto a PC?

best external hard drive format for mac image

Scott Barn

I have an external hard drive formatted for a Mac and I have to get the data from it onto my PC. Reformatting is not an option.

Answer
you'll need to get "MacDrive" for windows:


http://www.mediafour.com/products/macdrive

How do you save files and pictures from my mac to an external hard drive that has files from a pc?

Isabel

I run two computers, a pc and a mac. I've got thousands of photos that I can't store completely on the pc and need to be able to use on both computers. The external hard drive is formatted for mac and the pc. I can save files from the pc to the drive, but any attempt to save a file from the mac doesn't work. Can't find a reference online that offers help.

Answer
Move everything off the drive then format it in Fat32 (MS-DOS File System)
http://www.techiecorner.com/159/how-to-format-external-hard-disk-for-mac-and-windows/

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How do I reformat an external hard drive from a Mac to Windows 7, without a Mac?

best external hard drive format for mac image

Ty

I used to have a Mac desktop and laptop, so both of my external hard drives were formatted accordingly. I now have a Toshiba Satellite that runs on Windows 7. I am not able to view either of my external hard drives on my Toshiba - what do I do to change this? Thank you, in advance.

Answer
Does your windows 7 computer identify the devices? It may still identify the devices just not let you view the content of them because they are in a different format. If so take note of the drive letters and go into CMD and type "format drive:x" or something similar. Once it has formatted you should be able to import it as a foreign disk in Disk Management or simply now use it with your windows pc.

Let me know if this helps as im not sure how else it can be done without a mac.

What format should my external hard drive be formatted to work on a Mac and also hold files bigger than 4GB?

Alekz

I can't modify my external hard drive on my Mac because it's formatted on NTFS.

Then, What format should it be formatted if my files are bigger than 4GB? Fat32 doesn't let me save files any bigger than that! Any solution?

Answer
Well, you have encountered the limitations of using a PC formatted drive on a Mac. Is there any reason you're not wanting to format it as a Mac drive?

The normal reason for not doing this is because you want to share the drive with a PC. You haven't mentioned this situation and your question, but it's the only possibility I can think of.

So the bottom line, at least as far as I can see, is that if you want to share the drive with a PC then you aren't going to be able to do files over 4 GB. If you don't want to share it with a PC, then just reformat it as a Mac OS extended volume.

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