- Format Hdd For Mac And Windows Exfat
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- Format Hdd For Mac And Windows
- Format Disk For Mac And Windows
Most accessory makers tend to build accessories for the more dominant platforms, which is why a lot of computer peripherals tend to be more focused towards Windows users. This can make it a bit tricky if you’re a Mac user, especially if you’re looking to buy an external hard drive where sometimes, some models might come preformatted for Windows use.
Reformatting an External Hard Drive for MAC. Follow these steps to ensure you have a proper space to enjoy your files for a long time to come. Connect the external drive or the USB drive to the MAC. Start the Disk Utility, located under Applications Utilities. Find the name of the drive in the left side of the Utilities window and select it. Question: Q: How to format WD external drive for Mac More Less Apple Footer This site contains user submitted content, comments and opinions and is for informational purposes only.
We’re sure that some of you have encountered situations where you plug in an external hard drive or USB flash drive to your Mac computer, only to find that it won’t read or you can make changes to it due to it being formatted only for Windows. However, if you’re looking to ensure full compatibility between Windows and Mac, check out the steps below.
AdvertisingHow To Format An External Hard Drive For Mac
The process to format an external hard drive or USB flash drive for your Mac is pretty easy and straightforward.
- Plug in your external hard drive or USB flash drive to your Mac computer
- Launch the Disk Utility app which can be found in Applications > Other
- Select the drive from the left side of the window
- Click the Erase tab at the top of the screen
- Under Format, select ExFAT
- Click Erase and depending on how much you have stored on it, it could take seconds or minutes to complete.
- Once completed, you should see the new file type of your hard drive (note that prior to formatting it said NTFS).
Which File Format Should I Use?
During the process of formatting your hard drive, under the Format section you would have noticed that there are quite a few different options for you to choose from, so the question is, what are the differences between the file formats and which should you choose?
ExFAT
This is the option that we told you that you should choose if you wish to ensure that your hard drive will be compatible (which means that it can read and write) on both Windows and Mac computer systems.
MS-DOS FAT
Also known as FAT32 on some systems, this is another option that you can choose if you want to format a hard drive that will be compatible across Windows and Mac. However, one of the main differences between FAT32 and ExFat is that the former will only support file sizes of up to 4GB. This means that if you’re looking to transfer a video file that’s over 4GB in size, you will not be able to. This is due to the fact that FAT32 is an older file system.
APFS (Apple File System)
This is a newer file system that Apple introduced with its High Sierra update. It will be the default format that will be used for internal drives and also newer external hard drives that are designed specifically for Mac use. The upside is that it is more efficient, more reliable, and users can also choose to have it encrypted to protect the contents of their computer.
The downside is that it will not be compatible with older versions of macOS and will also not be compatible with Windows or Linux machines. However, if you’re only using Mac computers then this could be an option to consider.
Mac OS Extended (Journaled)
This file format was also previously known as HFS+. It was the file system that Apple had used prior to introducing APFS. For older Mac computers that do not run High Sierra or newer, Mac OS Extended will be the default format of choice. Similar to APFS, there are options to have it encrypted and password protected, and also users can choose to format it so that it can be case-sensitive for files that might require them.
Also, just like APFS, Mac OS Extended is not readable on Windows machines, so if you’re looking for cross-platform compatibility, ExFAT is still the best choice for now.
Filed in Apple >Computers. Read more about Mac (Apple), Microsoft and Windows.
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Summary :
Want to format an external hard drive for Mac and Windows PC? Do you know how to do this work easily? This post will show you specific methods to make external hard drive compatible with Mac and PC, which are easy and safe to complete.
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As we know, external hard drives are widely used to backup data or interchange files among different computers. Well, is there an external hard drive that could be shared between Mac and Windows PC? Of course, there is. Actually, most external hard disks could be compatible with Mac and PC as long as you format them correctly.
Why Need to Format External Hard Drive for Mac and PC
To put it simply, if you want to share external hard drive between Mac and PC, you need to format an external hard drive for Mac and PC.
Currently, hard drives for Windows PC are always formatted with NTFS, while hard disks for Mac are formatted with HFS+. However, when we connect a NTFS formatted disk to Mac, Mac OS X doesn't allow us to write files to the drive neither edit files, though it can read a NTFS drive. Similarly, Windows OS will ask us to format the HFS+ formatted drive when we connecting such a disk, let along edit files saved on HFS+ formatted hard disks unless we resort to third party programs.
But luckily, there are file systems well supported by both Mac and Windows PC, and they are FAT32 (it might be called MS-DOS on Mac) and exFAT. As long as we format the external hard drive to one of these 2 file systems, it can be shared between Mac and Windows.
Further Reading
Both FAT32 and exFAT have advantages and disadvantages.
FAT32: FAT32 works with all versions of Windows, Mac OS, Linux, game consoles, etc.
However, single files on a FAT32 drive can't be larger than 4GB. If your external drive saves files larger than 4GB or you plan to save larger files to this drive, converting to FAT32 is not recommended.
In addition, a FAT32 partition must be not more than 32GB if you create it in Windows Disk Management. Of course, there is free partition manager that can help create a FAT32 volume up to 2TB, which also functions correctly.
exFAT: exFAT has very large file size and partition size limits, which means it's a good idea to format your external hard drive to exFAT.
Nevertheless, a lot of users complained that exFAT is slow, and they highly suggest using FAT32 if you can avoid file size constraints.
Three Options for Accessing NTFS Drives on Mac
Paid Third-Party Drivers
Format Hdd For Mac And Windows Exfat
Some paid third-party NTFS drivers for Mac can be used to access NTFS drives on Mac. They work well and they have better performance than the free solutions which will be mentioned in the following part. Paragon NTFS for Mac is such a driver.
Besides, you can also use the paid third-party file system converters to convert NTFS to FAT32 or exFAT which are compatible with both Mac and PC. MiniTool Partition Wizard is one representative.
Free Third-Party Drivers
FUSE for macOS is a free and open-source NTFS driver that can enable write support. But, this solution is slower relatively. And the automatically mounting NTFS partitions in read-write mode can be a security risk for your Mac computer.
Apple’s Experimental NTFS-Write Support
The Mac OS has an experimental support for writing to NTFS drives. Usually, it is disabled by default and needs some messing around in the Mac terminal to enable it.
It doesn’t work properly all the time and could lead to potential issues with your NTFS file system. For example, it had corrupted data before. Thus, we don’t suggest using this tool and we believe it is disabled by this reason.
Here, we recommend using the paid third-party tools since they are easy-to-use and can do good work for you.
Then, we will introduce these three options for you in the following content.
The Best Paid Third-Party Driver: Paragon NTFS for Mac
Paragon NTFS for Mac can write, edit, delete, copy, or move files on NTFS volumes from your Mac computer. It offers a 10-day free trial. If you want to use it all the time, you need to pay for it.
With it, you don’t have to fiddle with terminal commands to mount partitions manually. Additionally, it can mount partitions automatically and safely. More importantly, it can code with the potential corruption. If you purchase a Seagate drive, you can even get a free download of Paragon NTFS for Mac.
All in all, it does its works well and gives you good user’s experience.
The Best Free Third-Party Drivers: FUSE for macOS
FUSE for macOS is a free solution to access NTFS on Mac. But it is less secure.
If you want to make automatically mount NTFS partitions in read-write mode on Mac, you need to temporarily disable the System Integrity Protection and replace one of Apple’s built-in tools with a binary that is more vulnerable to attack. Thus, your Mac is in danger when using this driver.
However, you can use it to manually mount NTFS partitions in read-write mode if you never mind using the Terminal. This will be safer, but you need to do more work. You can go to google the steps and see how complex they are.
Apple’s Experimental NTFS-Writing Support: Don’t Do This, Seriously
Although we mentioned this method in our article, we still don’t recommend it because it is the least tested. It is just for educational purposes, and it is available on Mac OS 10.12 Sierra. Perhaps, it will be unstable forever.
How to Quickly Format External Hard Drive for Mac and PC without Losing Data
Another way to access NTFS drive on Mac is to convert the NTFS/HFS+ to FAT/exFAT. Then, the drive can be used on both Mac and PC.
There should be some important data on the drive. To keep it safe, you can choose this best NTFS/HFS+ to FAT/exFAT converter: MiniTool Partition Wizard.
How to Convert NTFS to FAT32 or exFAT Without Data Loss
To format hard drive for Mac and Windows without data loss, we suggest using MiniTool Partition Wizard and its 'Convert NTFS to FATS32' function. If you are a personal user, you can try its Professional Edition.
Step 1: Run MiniTool Partition Wizard
Download this software to your computer. Then, you can open the software and input the license key to the pop-out window to get its Professional Edition.
Step 2: Convert NTFS to FAT32 with This Software
After running the program successfully, we can see its main interface as follows:
Here, please select the NTFS partition of external hard drive and choose 'Convert NTFS to FAT' feature from the left action pane. If there is more than one NTFS partition, convert all of them one by one.
At last, click 'Apply' button to make the change executed.
When MiniTool Partition Wizard shows it applies the change successfully, the original NTFS will finally become a FAT32 partition.
By this way, you can easily format an external hard drive for Mac and PC without losing any data. Then, you can share external hard drive between Mac and PC
You Can Convert NTFS to exFAT in 3 Steps
However, if you want to convert NTFS to exFAT to make external hard drive compatible with Mac and PC, 3 steps are required.
Step 1: Transfer Data out from External Hard Drive
You can choose to copy and paste those files to other external devices or internal hard disk of Windows, but it will cost much time. Instead, you can use MiniTool Partition Wizard Free Edition to create a copy for your external drive, which is faster.
If there is only one NTFS partition on external hard drive, refer to the tutorial Copy Partition to get instructions. However, if there is more than one NTFS partition, view Copy Disk to get specific operations.
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Step 2: Create exFAT Partition with MiniTool Partition Wizard
The Free Edition of this software also enables you to do this job.
Firstly, you need to delete the partition by using this software. Just open the software to enter its main interface. Then, choose the target partition and click 'Delete Partition' from the left action pane. After that, you should click 'Apply' to keep this change.
Secondly, the target partition will become unallocated. Here, you need to choose that partition and click on 'Create Partition' from the left action pane.
Thirdly, you will see a pop-out window. Here, you can choose 'exFAT' from the 'File System' setting option. At the same time, you can also set some other parameters for this partition, including 'Partition Label', 'Drive Letter', 'Size And Location'. After that, please click on 'OK'.
Fourthly, you will go back to the main interface. Then, please click on 'Apply' to save these changes.
Finally, an exFAT partition will be created on your external hard disk so that it could be shared between Mac and Windows PC
Step 3: Transfer Data back to External Drive
If you want to share files that you have backed up between Mac and PC, now please transfer these files back to external hard drive.
How to Convert HFS+ to FAT32 or exFAT without Losing Data
Besides, you can format an external hard drive for Mac and Windows by converting HFS+ to FAT32 or exFAT without losing any data.
Step 1: Backup Data in HFS+ Partition on Mac
Just transfer all useful files out from the external hard drive to other devices on Mac. Of course, if you have a backup already, ignore this step.
Step 2: Create a FAT32 or exFAT Partition on Windows PC
Some people may ask why create such partitions on Windows rather than Mac. That is because there are cases reporting FAT32 (MS-DOS) or exFAT partitions created on Mac did not work well on Windows.
Please skip to Solution 1: Format External Hard Drive to FAT32 to get steps to create a FAT32 partitions or go back to Step 2: Create exFAT Partition with MiniTool Partition Wizard to get operations to create an exFAT partition.
How to Make an Empty External Drive Compatible with Mac and PC
If there is no file saved on your external hard drive, how to make external hard drive compatible with Mac and PC?
It's very easy to share it between Mac and PC and you also need a Windows computer, a Mac machine, and the free partition manager MiniTool Partition Wizard Free Edition. https://everfunds758.weebly.com/free-dvd-burning-software-for-mac.html.
There are 3 solutions for this case, so please choose the one you like most to format external hard drive Windows 10/8/7.
Format Hdd For Mac And Pc
Solution 1: Format External Hard Drive Windows 10/8/7 to FAT32
Since users are unable to create a FAT32 partition larger than 32GB in Windows Disk Management, they need to use MiniTool Partition Wizard Free.
Note: when you connect an external hard drive which is formatted with HFS+ with computer, Windows may ask you to format the drive. Please choose Cancel.
Please download and install this program on your Windows computer to format an external hard drive for Mac and PC.
Firstly, open the software to enter its main interface as follows. Here, please select the NTFS partition or HFS+ partition of external hard drive, and click 'Delete Partition' feature from the left action pane. If there are multiple partitions on the external disk, please select the disk and click 'Delete All Partitions' feature instead. After that, an unallocated space will be released.
Secondly, you can create one or more FAT32 partitions in unallocated space. Select the unallocated space and choose 'Create Partition' feature from the left side.
Then, you should choose 'FAT32' from the 'File System' option in the pop-out window. Meanwhile, you can set properties for this new partition and click 'OK' to go back to the main window of Partition Wizard.
At last, click 'Apply' button to make all changes performed.
Solution 2: Format External Hard Drive Windows 7/8/10 to exFAT
Firstly, please delete the NTFS or HFS+ partition in either MiniTool Partition Wizard or Windows Disk Management to release unallocated space. Then, you can create an exFAT partition with MiniTool Partition Wizard Free Edition by following steps introduced in the section Step 2: Create exFAT Partition with MiniTool Partition Wizard.
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Once a FAT32 or exFAT partition is created on your external hard drive, you can share it on both Mac and Windows PC.
Solution 3: Create One HFS+ Partition for Mac and One NTFS Partition for Windows
Alternatively, you can create 2 partitions on the external hard drive: one is for Mac, and the other is for Windows. As to size for each partition, it depends on your own demands. By this way, you can easily format an external hard drive for Mac and Windows.
Step 1: Create a NTFS Partition and a FAT32 Partition
Please run MiniTool Partition Wizard Free Edition, then delete all the original NTFS or HFS+ partition(s), and create a new NTFS partition as well as a FAT32 partition, and the latter will be formatted to HFS+ in Mac machine.
Then, select the external hard drive and choose 'Delete All Partitions' to create an unallocated space.
Format Hdd For Macos
Here, select the unallocated space and choose 'Create Partition' feature from the left action pane.
Now, please specify partition label (Windows is recommended), partition type (primary or logical), drive letter, file system (NTFS), cluster size, and partition size (you can change the length of the handle to adjust partition size). Then, click 'OK' to continue.
Now, you can see a NTFS partition is created. Please use the same way to create a FAT32 partition labeled with Mac. At last, click 'Apply' button to make all changes performed.
Format Hdd For Mac And Windows
Step 2: Format the FAT32 Partition to HFS+ Partition on Mac
Please go to Utilities → Disk Utility to get the window below:
Then, select the external hard drive and click 'Partition' tab on the top.
Now, find the FAT32 partition and format it to OS X Extended (Journaled), which is the desired HFS+. Finally, click 'Apply' button to make all changes performed.
Tip: You may receive the prompt 'The volume 'MAC' is not journaled. As a result it can not be resized'. Just ignore the message and click 'OK' button to continue.
After NTFS partition and HFS+ partition are created on your external hard drive, it can be shared between Mac and Windows PC.
Note: You might be unable to share all files saved on external drive since Windows doesn't support HFS+ partition while Mac doesn't support NTFS partition completely.
Bottom Line
Are you planning to format an external hard drive for Mac and PC? If yes, now try one of our methods to make external hard drive compatible with Mac and PC.
Format Disk For Mac And Windows
Should you have any problem, just feel free to leave us a message in comment part below or send an email to [email protected].