Formatting a drive for mac and windows

This will help you format the drive for exfat so that it can be used on both platforms. If a wireless network is available, you can choose it from the wi. The top 5 disk formatting tools for windows and mac can help you securely format hard drive or external device under windowsmac os. After formatting, the data will be permanently lost. How to format a usb flash drive on windows 10 windows. A drive can be formatted with exfat using either a windows or a mac computer. In the main interface, right click the partition on that need. How to reinstall macos from macos recovery apple support. People might need to format a hard drive or an external hard drive in windows 10 for various reasons.

Either way there is a solution to having an existing external hard drive for mac and pc. The best ways to format an external drive for windows and mac. 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. 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 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. How to format drive with compatible file system for mac. Solved formatting external drive for mac and pc spiceworks. Right click on the partition and select delete volume this will remove the partition. Once you open the disk utility app, you can see all the drives on your mac are listed on the lefthand sidebar. Formatting your toshiba hard drive for mac is important, as it makes the hard drive best suitable for the mac by formatting it with the osspecific file system and drivers. Go through this article and find out the easiest way to format your toshiba drive for mac. Rightclick the removable drive and select the format option. To use hfsexplorer, connect your macformatted drive to your windows pc and launch hfsexplorer.

If you want to use the drive between a windows and mac machine, you can format it to fat32. Format your external drive with exfat for both mac and. How to format a hard drive windows 10, 8, 7, vista, xp. 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. How to share an external hard drive between mac and windows. Of course, if you have a backup already, ignore this step. Learn how to use macos recovery to reinstall the mac operating system on your builtin drive or an external drive. Rightclick on the drive you want to format, click on format. This will format the drive as exfat format and your drive is now compatible with both platforms. Whether you go the software or hardware route depends on your situation. The formatting process duration depends on size and type of the drive. For example, in windows xp my computer is equivalent to this pc on windows 10. Under file system box, select exfat for this drive. Moving files from macformatted external hard drive to pc.

But to get a hard drive to be compatible for both mac and pc, you have to choose the exfat. In the volume label field, type a label to quickly identify the flash drive in. Video showing how to format drive for mac and windows computers. How to format wd my passport in windows system just like disk utility on mac, there is an inbuilt tool known as disk management in windows. Formatting a drive may vary in terms of different operating systems, like windows and mac. I have bounced around the web trying to get instructions for formatting this portable drive for windows. Quickly format an external hard drive for mac and windows pc. If you wish to boot the drive on a pc or use it with older versions of windows, you may also need to set the partition scheme to master boot record mbr for full windows compatibility. A vast majority of video production will be done on a mac or windows operating system, so we arent going to cover linux.

However, you can format the drive to work with both windows and mac by using the exfat filesystem. Im not very computer savvy, so i want to ask some specific directions. Convert formatted drive from mac to windows info remo. Mac os journaled is the formatting option for mac and ntfs or msdoc is the formatting option for pc. How to choose the best format for usb drive on windowsmac. In the file system list box, choose exfat, type in. If youre lucky, you can just rightclick each partition on the mac drive and select delete volume to remove the partitions. Click the file menu and select load file system from device. Plug in the external hard drive into the system and open windows explorer by clicking on the computer section in the side bar, you will see your external hard drive get attached to your system. It is the reliable disk formatting tool for windowsmac.

From what im reading, an exfat formatted drive can only be read on windows vista or higher, so it appear msdos fat is how im going to have to go. That said, if you are using both a pc and mac in the workflow, youll need to use a different. Format a usb drive as exfat for mac and windows compatibility. Finally, when all preferences are set, click the erase button. Just like windows, macos also gives us a seamless option to format hard drive for mac and pc. Windows uses ntfs and mac os uses hfs and theyre incompatible with each other. And it also wipes out all the bugs and harmful files that might harm your mac. 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. The mac drive may have an efi system partition on it. A hard disk drive will take longer to format than a flash drive. How to format new or second hard drive on windows 10mac. Once formatted, the existing data on the disk are probably unrecoverable for most people. You can use lacie setup assistant to format your lacie hard drive when it is first connected to a computer windows or mac.

Seagate backup plus is preformatted exfat for compatibility with both mac and windows computers. Lacie setup assistant helps you to quickly format the storage device according to your needs. The exfat format supports virtually any size hard drive and file, unlike the outdated fat32 format. Select the mac drive from the list of drives make sure this is the drive you want to work on, if you do it for the windows formatted drive in the list, it may cost you a lot of important data. How to format new hard drive on windows 10 windows central. Rightclick the new hard drive and select the format option. How to format external hard drives for mac and 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. How to format an external hard drive on windows and mac.

Just select the one you want to format and click on the erase tab. How to format a hard drive on windows or mac avast. The system reserved partition is where recovery files are kept for diagnostics and repairing damaged windows 10 files. How to format an external hard drive for mac and windows. The below steps for formatting external drive is for windows 10 and also.

The operating system has an inbuilt tool, which is known as disk utility. You can select the exfat format when using the disk utility to format the drive. It will automatically locate the connected drive, and you can load it. External hard drive compatible with mac and pc without. Aborted lacie setup assistant while it was formatting. Now enter the name for the external drive which will be used after formatting and also select exfat for format option and click on the erase. Now in this interface, you will see a format option. You can format an external hard drive or thumb drive to work seamlessly with both mac and windows by using the exfat file system. Step 6 once formatting completes, you can then use your drive in mac as a usual hard drive. How to format a flash drive to work on os x and windows. Here is what i see on my windows pc after i formatted the drive on the mac using msdos fat. In specific, if you want to know how to format a new or second hard drive in windows 10, dont. How to format a hard drive for both windows and mac.

Using it, you can erase a hard drive, create new partitions, and even repair your disk as well. For instructions on how to format your hard drive on a mac, please reference the following links. Just transfer all useful files out from the external hard drive to other devices on mac. Lacie mobile drive is preformatted exfat for compatibility with both mac and windows computers. Aweeraser is the outstanding one among the 5 disk formatting tools. Lacie mobile drive user manual optional formatting and. Rightclick your flash drive and then select format. To use hfsexplorer, connect your mac formatted drive to your windows pc and launch hfsexplorer. Both fat32 and exfat can be used on windows pc and mac. Select the unallocated drive listed, click new, click apply then ok. In the value label field, type a descriptive name for the drive.

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. Use the file system dropdown menu, and select ntfs recommended. Im here to use a windows 10 based hp laptop to format my lexar drive. This will split the drive into multiple partitions, select the primary partition then click next. For instance, users want to write data to and read data from, to do a clean installation of the windows system, to get rid of a virus or malware, to erase the data before giving the drive to someone else or throwing it away. Compare the different options for formatting an external hard drive to work with windows and mac. How to convert a macformatted drive to a windows drive. If you are on an earlier operating system like windows 7, xp, etc. I hope you enjoyed my article on how to make an external hard drive compatible with mac and pc without reformatting. Rightclick on windows icon, select disk management. If youre formatting a drive that youve been using and that has data on it, doublecheck in explorer that the drive letter youre choosing here in disk management is the same as the one you see in explorer that has the information on it that you want to erase. How to format external hard drive to use on mac and pc.