- HOW TO FORMAT AN EXTERNAL HARD DRIVE FOR BOTH MAC AND PC HOW TO
- HOW TO FORMAT AN EXTERNAL HARD DRIVE FOR BOTH MAC AND PC INSTALL
Alternatively, you can install a program like Microsoft’s NTFS software from Paragon (paid app) or the open source Tuxera (free) on your Mac to enable the NTFS read / write support, but, even with third-party options, some features, including Time Machine, will not work properly with an NTFS file system.
HOW TO FORMAT AN EXTERNAL HARD DRIVE FOR BOTH MAC AND PC HOW TO
Here’s how to partition a hard drive for use on Windows and Mac. You can check our Windows section for more information on this process. If you are concerned about the reliability factor of the exFAT file system, or the lack of it, there is a way to format the secondary Windows partition to NTFS, but it requires connecting the hard drive to a Windows computer. Note that you will see icons on the desktop for both units. Click the Partition button in an additional pop-up window to complete the process. To learn how to format an external hard drive can be helpful as the information helps one in deriving the knowledge to repair their own hard disk drives. Enter a volume name, select the exFAT format, and click the Apply button. A second part appears, cutting the pie chart in half. On the next screen, click the little plus ( + ) button below the blue pie chart to add a second partition. Select the drive again in Disk Utility and click Partition. After completing this procedure, your disk should have only one partition. Click the Delete button to make these changes. Just read and follow the detailed steps to get your important files back. In the next pop-up window, select a profile, in this case MacOS Extended (Journaled) for Format, and GUID Partition Map for Scheme or Partition Type. It is absolutely possible to recover data from a fully formatted external hard drive on Mac or PC. In this video tutorial, I show you how to easily format an external hard drive to work on both a Mac and a PC.If you run into the issue. Click Delete, located on the top toolbar of the application. How To Format A Hard Drive To Work On Mac and PC - YouTube. With Disk Utility open, in the Location option, your drive appears in External on the left. Double-click the Disk Utility icon in the next window. With Finder highlighted, click Go in the menu bar followed by Utilities in the drop-down menu.
If the error does not appear, start with step 1. Like Windows 10, you may see an “initialization” error because the drive’s file system is not “readable.” Click the Initialize button in the small pop-up screen to create the first compatible partition, and then start at step 5.
If there is not partition on the disk or the disk is marked with Not Initialized, you cannot format it directly. Step 2: Locate the external hard drive in Disk Management and check its status. If you already have a Mac compatible partition, continue from step 5. Step 1: Access Windows 10 Disk Management by right-clicking Start menu and selecting Disk Management item from the list. Partitioning an external disk in MacOS is not that annoying, initially, we will assume that it does not have partitions, so we will need to create two.