Format drive for windows and mac

A new window will pop up asking which file system youd like to format the external drive to. How to format external hard drives on a mac sweetwater. Go to the applications folder on your macs hard drive, then go to the utilities folder. Most external hard drives hd are sold in a format called ntfs, which is designed to work with windows. The best ways to format an external drive for windows and. After formatting, the data will be permanently lost. How to format external hard drives for mac and windows. The best ways to format an external drive for windows and mac. Select the drive you wish to format from the list in the left sidebar of the disk utility window. Make sure your external hard drive is attached and mounted to.

All data has to be put in a file format that the operating system can read off the hard drive. If youre lucky, you can just rightclick each partition on the mac drive and select delete volume to remove the partitions. In order to use the drive on both systems you can just format it. How to format external hard drive to use on mac and pc. How to format a hard drive on windows or mac avast.

Opening disk management can be done a number of ways depending on your version of windows, but the easiest method is to type diskmgmt. Rather than use a mac formatted drive, you should get the important files off of it and use exfatformatted drives for moving data between macs and pcs. Rightclick your flash drive and then select format. Rightclick on it and select the format option from the context menu. Compare the different options for formatting an external hard drive to work with windows and mac. Aweeraser is the outstanding one among the 5 disk formatting tools. A drive can be formatted with exfat using either a windows or a mac computer. Next, open a command prompt window as administrator. Format and external hard drive on mac first, lets see how to format an external hard drive or usb drive in macos which works with both mac and pc platforms, first plugin your drive in macos machine. How to format a hard drive using the command prompt tom. How to share an external hard drive between mac and windows. The operating system has an inbuilt tool, which is known as disk utility.

How to format a hard drive windows 10, 8, 7, vista, xp. On mac computers, use the finder app to browse and manage files on your computer and external hard drives. To format a drive on a mac, youll need the builtin disk utility application. Both fat32 and exfat can be used on windows pc and mac. I have an old external 1 tb hard drive id like to format for use with apple time machine backup. If you only use a mac computer, you can format your thumb drive so it can work on windows systems. The mac drive may have an efi system partition on it. A window will pop up where you can choose the format ntfs, fat32, or exfat. For a windows computer to be able to read a hard drive, it needs to have a file system format that is compatible with windows.

Bonus tip data recovery from formatted hard drive on mac. How to format new or second hard drive on windows 10mac. However, fat32 has a maximum 4gb file size limit whereas exfat can work with files as large as 16eb. In the file system list box, choose exfat, type in a volume label.

Choosing the right format for your external hard drive b. Please keep in mind that reformatting will result in the loss of all the data on the hard drive so make sure you back up your data elsewhere before starting. Format a usb drive as exfat for mac and windows compatibility. The problem is that the disk is currently formatted as ntfs and is not readable with time machine. How to choose the best format for usb drive on windowsmac. Can a windows computer read a macformatted hard drive. Go to open disk utility, which is located under applications in the finder menu.

Although in principal, formatting means to erase existing data and free up space for utilization, the procedures are not exactly the same for mac and windows. The easiest way to do that is hit cmd and the spacebar at. How to format a new or second hard drive in windows 10 formatting a drive may vary in terms of different operating systems, like windows and mac. While you have bought this drive, you will find the drive already formatted for your mac or windows system.

For this reason, a macformatted hard drive is not directly compatible, nor readable by a windows computer. Windows only formatted drives are ntfs and they are readonly on a mac. For most reasons to erase, including when reformatting a disk or selling, giving away, or trading in your mac, you should erase your entire disk. Type diskpart into the command prompt window and press enter. Then click the erase button at the top of the window, in the new popup window, and type the name of drive. Learn how to use macos recovery to reinstall the mac operating system on your builtin drive or an external drive. Windows on the other hand cannot read mac formatted drives period. Once you open the disk utility app, you can see all the drives on your mac are listed on the lefthand sidebar. While you can read files from these drives just fine, if you need to write to a pcformatted hard drive, youll need some thirdparty software to get the job done. How to format a hard drive for both windows and mac.

Keep in mind that you can only format storage devices that are currently not in use. How to format drive with compatible file system for mac. Choose the exfat file system in the list and click start. External hard drives use either spinning disks or solid memory to save your files. To format external drive to file system compatible with mac and pc, connect the drive to your computer and follow the detailed steps given below take formatting hard drive to exfat in windows 7 for example. Insert the flash drive or hard drive you want to format for windows compatibility. Now in this interface, you will see a format option. To format the drive in windows, rightclick it in the file explorer window and select format.

This is due to the fact that ntfs, the file system utilized by windows pcs, has limited support on mac. Just like windows, macos also gives us a seamless option to format hard drive for mac and pc. Formatting the hard drive a vast majority of video production will be done on a mac or windows operating system, so we arent going to cover linux. How to reinstall macos from macos recovery apple support. You can make this your client name or your company name. How to format a flash drive to work on os x and windows. The top 5 disk formatting tools for windows and mac can help you securely format hard drive or external device under windows mac os.

Rather than use a macformatted drive, you should get the important files off of it and use exfatformatted drives for moving data between macs and pcs. Follow these easy steps to format a hard drive in windows 10, windows 8, windows 7, windows vista, or windows xp. In the main interface, right click the partition on that need. So, if you want to use an external hard drive on both windows and mac, you need to format it to a filesystem that is compatible with windows pc and mac. If you want to use the drive between a windows and mac machine, you can format it to fat32. Another way to format drives is to go to windows explorer, rightclick on the drive to format and select format. For example, in the screenshot below, the macformatted drive is disk 2. If you have a usb flash drive inserted in your mac, you can see it under the external in the disk utility. Just select the one you want to format and click on the erase tab. If a wireless network is available, you can choose it from the wi. Quickly format an external hard drive for mac and windows pc. Then click the dropdown menu beside format and select msdos fat the fat32 file format or exfat. How to format an external hard drive for mac and windows. Format usb flash drives to work with both mac and windows.

From what i understand, windows doesnt always like the way mac s do the formatting on some larger drives, though, so give it a try and if your windows machines dont like it, just format the drive with windows. You can then rightclick in the empty space and select new simple volume to create a partition and format it with the windows ntfs or fat32 file systems. To format an external hard drive for mac with time machine, you must follow the steps below. Then do a right click with your mouse to pull up a menu. For instructions on how to format your hard drive on a mac, please reference the following links. How to format or partition an external hard drive for mac. While you cant select an individual drive letter, this is still an easy way to format any drive into fat32, ntfs, or exfat.

Select your drive from the list and rightclick on it. File systems compatible with windows include fat32 and ntfs why not. Buying an external hard drive is one of the best options for adding the storage space to the mac computer system. You can format external hard drive or other external drives with exfat or fat32 file system for mac and windows, so that both mac and windows computer can read and write it. Please see below on how to reformat your external hard drive on mac and windows. If you want to use the external drive for both mac and pc, you can also select exfat. Format your western digital my passport external hard drive to fat32 or exfat format so to transfer the data between a mac and windows system conveniently. How to format a drive for mac and pc compatibility. How to format external hard drive mac 2 simple methods. If the hard drive you want to format is connected to your pc, it should be there. Make sure the allocation unit size is set to default and type in a volume label. Format your external drive with exfat for both mac and. The instructions below are for windows 10, but other versions of windows from windows 7 and up can also format an external drive as exfat for use with mac as well.

Step 2 follow the steps above to format the drive, and then you can use it with time machine on your mac system. How to erase a disk for mac use disk utility to erase format a hard disk, ssd, flash drive, or other storage device. Give the drive a descriptive name and leave the default settings. However, you have to reformat the drive to make it functional with your mac computer. It is the reliable disk formatting tool for windows mac.

Open disk management, the hard drive manager included with all versions of windows. Step 1 open finder, applications, then go to utilities and disk utility. How to convert a macformatted drive to a windows drive. There are specific thirdparty systems, like digital camcorders, and sony playstation 3, which need the drives to be formatted in either fat32 or exfat format to perform read from and. To format a hard drive for windows, open the file explorer and click on this pc. Using it, you can erase a hard drive, create new partitions, and even repair your disk as well.