OS X :: External Hard Drive Format For Mac And Windows
May 8, 2010
I bought a new 1TB external hard drive. What formats should I choose in Disk Utility to make this disc compatible with both Mac and Windows? I rarely have files over 2GB and my Mac is running on Snow Leopard.
I'm running Snow Leopard on my new Macbook Pro. I've got a 1.5TB External hard drive that I'm trying to figure out how to format in HFS+ with Apple Partition Map. I can figure out how to format in HFS using Disk Utility, however it still does it in GUID format and I do not know how to do it in Apple Partition Map.
Googleing this for hours has lead with all kinds of information on how to go to GUID FROM Apple Partition Map but not the other way around. I know GUID is the new hottness.. but this drive will be used exclusively to connect to my XBOX 360 and it supposedly only reads HFS+ when its formatted with Apple Partition Map. (I have tried it with Mac OS Extended (Journaled) with GUID, and the XBOX does NOT recognize it) I do not want to use Fat 32, (I know that that is the other major option) beacuse it limits file size.
I just brought a Western Digital 1TB USB drive for my Mac Pro. Now when I try and format it in Mac OSX journaled it keeps coming up in an error saying it can't be done, It will format as FAT32 but I need it to be Mac OSX formatted. Does anyone know what might be wrong?
I just bought a new WD Elements (1tb) and I am getting an error when I try and format. I wish I could tell you what that error says but I was trying to figure something else out so I chose the disk6s1 and formatted it to os extended but it seems like it is frozen. I am afraid if I force quit it will screw up the drive. This is the 2nd one I have tried, I returned the 1st one thinking the drive was faulty. Now I think I screwed up the drive when I formatted it in disk utility. I have installed 2 western digital internal Hard Drives into my Pro and have used 2 other external HDs both western digitals. If there was any problems with any of my HDs, I would open up Disk Utility and Erase them to be Mac OS Extended (My WD TV won't read Journaled drives).
I am going to be buying an external hard drive soon (Seagate FreeAgent Go 250GB 2.5" External Hard Drive - Black) and I want to double format Or double partition it. I am pretty good with macs, I just don't know much about time machine and external hard drives. What I want to do is either:
A) Make a partition in which I can make backups, and make a separate partition in which I can store files B) Make a single partition in which I can save back ups (from time machine) and my files (Music, Movies, Applications)
Also, would I be able to run Windows (XP) from my external hard drive somehow? Also, could I run mac applications off my external hard drive, is there a certain procedure?
Verbatim Store 'n' Go USB 2.0 Portable Hard Drive 500Gb
this is a external hard drive i am looking to buy,but it has Nero back it up and burn software already on it,so in order for me to use it on my macbook,would i need to format it?
I'm trying to work out how to format my external hardrive so my MacBook Pro, Windows and PS3 can all have read and view access. If it can't be done can this be done: MacBook Pro: Read and View Access Windows: View Only Access PS3: View Only Access My external hardrive is WD 500gb Passport and i'm running Snow Leopard
Alright, so My ipod is formatted for windows when formatted in this you can only copy chunks of 4 gig things using it as an external. but if you change the formatt of it to take all sizes, then it's not compatible with mac and pc. =/ i had it originally formatted for pc because i just recently got a mac book pro and it's my primary computer. well on to the hard drive trouble that is related i'm borrowing my friends external to get a 8 gig file from my pc to my mac. it's formatted in fat32(windows and mac read) but that format only allows for a 4 gig max to be put on it at one time. so i guess i'm outta luck there, i've looked at JR split but who knows it that will work. My main q is, i'm going to be getting my own personal external soon and i want to know whats the best way to format it that it will mount on my pc and my mac and allow me to copy more that 4 gigs of stuff on it at a time.
I have bought an external hard drive (Fujitsu) recently and turned into an Mac OS Extended (Journaled) format. I was wondering can it be formatted on the same lines as an iPod. I mean like the iPod that can be detected as an external hard drive by both Windows & Mac. Can't I do the same for my external hard drive?
I used my external hard rive for installing linux(ubuntu) in my other machine. Now when I use the hard rive in mac os or windows, it does not respond very well. When I use windows for transferring files, it shows 1Mbps transfer rate. But it used to have 25 Mbps transfer rate in windows. Now when i use this drive in my mac, it does not show anything. I then used disk utility to reformat it to Mac os x extended journaled, it just gets stuck in Mounting..... like forever. Is there any way to reformat it Fully (i mean "fully" to remove the core files and rebuilding the system files for my external hard drive)) by using 'terminal' or disk utility? Is the hard rive hardware damaged(but the file transfers in windows though slowly? My external hard rive details are:
1.WD external
2.USB 2.0
3.size: 1TB
Info: MacBook Pro (15-inch Late 2011), OS X Mavericks (10.9.4)
I have an external drive that will need to be connected at different times to both my Mac (Leopard) and my Windows XP & Vista machines. I had it formatted for Mac OS (Journaled) but it wasn't readable in XP or Windows. So what is the best format so that all can read/write to it normally? NTFS? It needs to be able to handle larger files (4GB and bigger).
i'd like to format my lacie external hard drive with two partitions:
1. HFS+ partition as a bootable clone of my internal drive
2. FAT32 partition readable by any windows (and mac) machine
i'm creating my partitions with disk utility, but i hit a snag when choosing a partition scheme...apparently i cannot choose a different scheme for each partition.
so when i format the drive with GUID, the FAT32 partition is not even recognized by windows XP. but when i format the drive with master boot record (MBR), the HFS+ partition is not bootable...
I bought a WD My Book Essential to do Time Machine backups. It is formatted for a PC but I was told I need to format for my IMac before I can use it. How do I do that? Is it a complicated process? I have only been using a Mac for about a year now and am still learning about them.
i have just bought and external hard drive and want to put stuff on it. i know i hav to format it somehow using disk utility on my imac. what do i format it to so i can use it on both mac and pc? it is set to read only in "get info" and ms-dos fat in disk utility.
I can't manage to format my Seagate 500GB external HD correctly so it can be readable with my Macbook. I formatted like six times already in Windows 7 and XP to NTFS and still my macbook won't read it...only my Windows computers can read/write it. What am I doing wrong?
got a real basic question to ask and you're gonna think im an idiot for asking...I just bought a 320gb western digital elements hard drive and want to reformat it so that its compatible for both mac and pc's. i intend to format it as NTFS-3G as it would allow me to use it on the 2 platforms without having the 4GB file size restriction that fat32 has, anyway.....
when I go to reformat my external hard drive in disk utility, I see my external hard drive to the left, and there's a "sub" hard drive as a child of the external hd listed uppermost. just wandering which one of the two do i select before going to Erase>Windows NT filesystem (NTFS-3G)>erase? Do I select the uppermost drive and erase that or the lower one? or both
The hard drive is a 1TB Western Digital my book I bought it in January I think. I tried to format it to Mac OS Extended (Journaled) when I got it but for some reason every time I try to erase the part thats named disk3s2 or partition the main one it stops a little before half way through. I don't think its the hard drives fault so I called apple about it one day and they helped a little but it didn't work. Thanks in advance if you can help me. Also a few times I waited about seven hours for it while I was at school and when I came home it didn't move.
I received an Acomdata 2Tb external hard drive today from Amazon and plugged it in. Time Machine popped up and I declined to link the hard drive to it. I went into Disk Utility and chose the new hard drive on the left column and went to erase. I chose Mac OS Extended. I named it and hit erase. It started going, and going..... and going... and a half an hour later I knew something was wrong.
Disk Utility was not responding and I eventually had to Force Quit. Now I cannot format the hard drive. I starts and then it stops with a disk error. I tried to run the First Aid verify and repair and both stopped after a few seconds with an error. What do I do?
I just got my new Seagate 640gb external hard drive and am in the process of formatting it on my MBP. However, I am not sure which format to do? My main use for the hard drive is for transferring media files back and forth between my MBP and PC using just one partition on the drive. I already know I'm not supposed to pick 'Mac OS Extended (Journaled)' because I believe that is to use it as a boot drive. So should I pick 'Mac OS Extended' or maybe 'Free Space'?
I have an external hard drive that I was previously using on PC, having attempted to use it on a Mac, it will not write to it. I've found that I have to format to FAT32, which I think i can just about manage (yes, im a girl) but my concern is, if i format through the MAC, will i then lose what's on the hard disk as the tab says 'erase'? I have a lot of images on the hard disk so am a little petrified! Any advice for this really basic question would be appreciated!
I had a Windows based PC a couple of years ago that had crashed. So recently i tried to put the files from my old hard drive from my Windows computer to my Mac. In order to keep track of what i have copied and what I haven't i thought it would be good to delete the stuff of my windows hard drive once it was copied. However, it doesn't let me delete anything of the Windows drive since it is set to read only. Is there a way around this? i've tried everything i can think of, but haven't found a soluti
Is there any way without creating a usb bootable install cd that I can install windows XP onto my USB Hard Drive and boot from it in mac? If I can download a already bootable version of XP, please show me a link (please tell me if thats not allowed). Also, my H.D. doesn't show up when I boot up and hold option. Thanks In Advance
Im running on a UMP 13" base model + 4GB Ram, I want to know whats the best way to install widows on an external hard drive on my macbook ? do i need anti virus as well ?
I'm having some huge problems. I have an .iso of Windows 7 Ultimate but my whole problem is that my macbooks dvd-rom drive crapped out on me a year ago so no burning no reading and Disc Utility wont let me restore the iso onto an external hard drive.
Does anyone have any idea what I could do to fix this? Is there a way I can put the image onto the hard drive at all?
I have an external hard drive which I have successfully installed Windows XP SP3 onto. It was a long and painful process but I finally was able to get a modified XP install disc ready and from a Dell PC running Windows was able to install onto the external hard drive and I'm able to boot from it and everything. I did this on a PC because I couldn't for the life of me figure out how to boot correctly from an external drive in Mac.
Anyway, the hardest part is in the past and now my only problem is how to boot this external hard drive from my macbook, which is primarily what I want to use it on. I currently have a Macbook with three operating systems on it: Mac OS 10.5.8, Ubuntu Linux, and Windows XP SP3. I use rEFIt to boot into these operating systems. I tried using rEFIt to boot into XP on the external hard drive but it just gives me the legacy error messages saying that it couldn't load and noting the booting legacy os is not well supported by mac.
so today I bought a Toshiba external harddrive (black with green stripes?) and it has 160 GB capacity. I run windows on my Black MacBook, and am starting to run out of room on both (its 1/2 and 1/2 partitions of OS X and XP) Is there a way for me to put my windows onto my external harddrive and then restore my internal to ALL osx? then, I could just plug in the external harddrive and hold down something at start, and then it would boot up in windows?
(If this is possible, please just say it's not, but if it is, some detailed instructions