Format hard drive for mac and windows exfat support

It can be fully supported by windows systems and readonly supported by 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. But somehow, macos doesnt allow you to write data to the drive. Use the exfat file system and never format your external. Reformat drive to exfat to be compatible with both windows and mac. How to format an external hard drive for windows 10.

How to format a hard drive for mac internal, external or. How to make external hard drive compatible with mac and pc. How to format a drive for mac and pc compatibility macyourself. Formatting is a very simple procedure which is operated in a similar way for all sorts of storage media. If you wish to format external hard drive in exfat follow the steps below. How to format external hard drive mac 2 simple methods. 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. The fat or file allocation table is quite possibly the most widelysupported disk format in existence today. Should i reformat this drive to exfat or just keep it as ntfs and install a program like tuxera or.

If you need to make the external hard drive be compatible with. For instructions on how to format your hard drive on a mac, please reference the following links. Just select the one you want to format and click on the erase tab. Rightclick on the drive you want to format, click on format. How to format hard drive to exfat in windows 7810 three ways. If you want to format your external hard drive to work with mac and windows computers, you should use exfat. Choosing the right format for your external hard drive b. When you format a partition or drive in windows 10, there are three types of file system you wont be unfamiliar, ntfs, fat32 and exfat. Even microsofts own xbox 360 failed to support ntfs, but microsoft finally. You can bring back the corrupted exfat drive to normal state. Disk utility on mac supports several file system formats. How to format drive for mac and windows computer technician blog. The oldest versions of operating systems compatible with exfat are listed.

Open up windows explorer and rightclick on your drive in the sidebar. How to share an external hard drive between mac and windows. Windows will choose ntfs for you because thats microsofts native filing system. How to format hard drives on windows, mac and linux. When formatting a partition, hard drive or any storage device connected to a computer, windows will let you choose the file system file system which is ntfs, fat32 and exfat. This mac propriety file system and is used in ios and mac. Detach the drive and format it on your host macintosh on which your drive was not detected. In the file system dropdown, choose exfat instead of ntfs. Now in this interface, you will see a format option. Format a disk for windows computers in disk utility on mac apple.

In the main interface, right click the partition on that need. Its a direct continuation of the original dos format used on floppy diskettes and hard drives. While exfat is not quite as widely supported as fat32, its still compatible with many tvs, cameras and other similar devices. Format a disk for windows computers in disk utility. Open disk utility and click the drive you want to format. How to format a hard drive for both windows and mac. Apple mac machines support a different file system. So if you want your external hard drive to be backward compatible with both oss then you need to reformat it with fat32 or exfat. There are various methods to format your external hard drive to exfat on windows 10. How to format a hard drive on windows or mac avast.

Essentially, choosing ntfs, fat32 or exfat before formatting a partition or drive is important because it will affect your storage and future use. Step 1 open finder, applications, then go to utilities and disk utility. Thus, if you want to make a hard drive compatible with windows 7 and mac, you may need to format the drive to exfat or fat32. Format hdd to fat32 in windows 10 with command prompt. So in any case where the fat32 file system is required, you can apply the following two methods to format the external hard drive to fat32 in windows 1087 at once.

The best ways to format an external drive for windows and. Just connect the external drive to your win8 pc and use the file manager to view. How to format a drive in exfat formatting in windows 73 ways. So, you just bought an external hard drive or a portable ssd and wanted to use it on your mac. Quickly format an external hard drive for mac and windows pc.

Fat32 is another option, but it limits file transfer to 4gb, so choose exfat when. 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. You can format the drive from either the mac or the windows machine. In this guide were using exfat instead of fat32, another filesystem that.

Exfat format external hard drive free downloads and. If you want to format an external hard drive or usb flash drive in exfat, you can follow these steps. Under file system box, select exfat for this drive. File system formats available in disk utility on mac. Please like, sub, share if you find this video helpful. I have a usb flash drive with a ton of music and a copy of windows 7. If you format your external hard drive to hfs, you can use it on mac and linux by removing journaling. How to format a hard drive for both windows and mac laptop mag. The best ways to format an external drive for windows and mac. Ntfs, a modern file system, is used in system drive by default due to its advanced features what benefit system running. But to get a hard drive to be compatible with both mac and pc, you have to choose the exfat formatting options. Overwrite exfat format of 8tb external drive with ntfs.

Now that you know which format to use, check out our guide on how to format your hard drive on. However, to use it on windows you can hfs explorer read only. This is the format used when an external drive needs to be shared between apple and windows devices. The operating system has an inbuilt tool, which is known as disk utility. But if you want the external hard drive to also work on a mac, you should choose exfat, which is an upgraded version of fat32. By default, usb flash drives and external storage are formatted with the ntfs file. Windows has no difficulty reading harddrives formatted in exfat. Format your external drive with exfat for both mac and. Finally, when all preferences are set, click the erase button.

If you require single files to be larger than 4gb, use exfat instead, though you will lose. Almost since exfat is fairly new, it isnt compatible with older macs and pcs. The formatting process duration depends on size and type of the drive. I am considering formatting this drive as exfat so that both windows 7 and mac os can both read and write to this drive without the need to partition the drive. Once you open the disk utility app, you can see all the drives on your mac are listed on the lefthand sidebar. Now your usb flash drive is formatted with ntfs format. Enter a volume name, select the exfat format, and click the apply button. Thats all because its been initialized with windows nt file system ntfs, which is primarily for pcs. How to format an external hard drive for mac and windows. Format a usb drive as exfat for mac and windows compatibility.

When you have a new hard drive, or when youre reinstalling windows, the os may ask you to format the drive. Choose this format if the size of the disk is over 32 gb. 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. And to support ntfs on android use stick mount or paragon ntfs, hfs and exfat.

To make sense of why ms would cut off the use of exfat for internal hard drives, it has to be understood that exfat still doesnt have a final specification. Whats the difference between fat32, exfat, and ntfs. A drive can be formatted with exfat using either a windows or a mac computer. The whole purpose of exfat was to allow easy transfer of large files between platforms in a format that didnt require third party drivers on either the mac or windows to read the drive. How to format or partition an external hard drive for mac. To format the drive in windows, rightclick it in the file explorer window and select format. Click the partition button in an additional popup window to complete the process. With exfat, you can store files of any size, and use it with any computer made in the last 20 years. Fat32 is most compatible file system format that can be readandwrite in many. To format an external hard drive for mac with time machine, you must follow the steps below. Choose this format if the size of the disk is 32 gb or less. So, whether you wish to format the internal hard drive, external drive, or a usb flash drive, the procedure is the same for all. To format the primary drive the hard disk where the operating system resides you need to boot into the setup program on windows 7 or windows 10 and use it to format your drive.

Bonus tip data recovery from formatted hard drive on mac. Lacie mobile drive 2tb external hard drive hdd moon silver usbc usb 3. Find out how to format an external drive or usb disk making the drive work with both windows pc and mac can read and write. Mac os lets me format this internal drive as exfat but windows 7 wont let me format it. Learn a few ways to make your drive mac and pc friendly.

You will probably find that the programs for unlocking the drive require it to be formatted to ntfs, so if you need to change the formatting of the drive you will almost certainly lose that functionality. If so then format it to fat32 or exfat using a windows pc. In disk utility on your mac, format a disk that can be used with both windows computers. In disk utility on your mac, format a disk that can be used with both windows computers and. Now, im in limbo as to the format i should have on this drive. Using it, you can erase a hard drive, create new partitions, and even repair your disk as well. How to format your hard drive to exfat file system on.

If given a choice, the two common modes are ntfs and fat32. In case, your drive fails to show up on any other mac machines then it seems like the problem lies within the exfat drive. 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. The only free application that will let you do this we are aware of is hfsexplorer, which uses java and is really only suitable for the odd file transfer fat32 the most compatible option. Format a disk for windows computers in disk utility on mac. If you have an external hard drive or usb flash drive that youd like to use on both. You cant format the hard disk on which windows is stored while windows is running, for the same reasons that you cant work on a cars engine while you. I got my hands on a new adata hd710, 1tb external hard drive. A hard disk drive will take longer to format than a flash drive. How can an exfat formatted hard drive from a mac be. By default, mac os x can only read ntfs drives, not write to them.

Step 2 follow the steps above to format the drive, and then you can use it with time machine on your mac system. Whether youre formatting an internal drive, external drive, usb flash drive, or sd card, windows gives you. We dont recommend you to use any paid tool for this purpose, as there are betterintegrated features with windows 10 that can help you with the process of formatting your hard drive to exfat file system. While it may sound like a weightloss product from a latenight infomercial, exfat is a hard drive format that feels like the child of ntfs and fat32. One is to use a paid 3rd party tool to add ntfs write support to a mac, such as paragons ntfs for. Click the format popup menu, then choose one of the following. Format external driveusb exfat in windows 10 in simple steps. How to format drive with compatible file system for mac. Compare the different options for formatting an external hard drive to work with windows and mac. Just like windows, macos also gives us a seamless option to format hard drive for mac and pc. Format your external drive with exfat for both mac and windows use. From what i understand, windows doesnt always like the way macs 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. Right click on start and select command prompt admin.