By default, the 4tb hard drive uses the ntfs format for windows pcs, but theres a help file included on the drive that provides information for mac users so that you can reformat the drive and. Jump straight to the section you want with these quick links. Either way there is a solution to having an existing external hard drive for mac and pc. Mar 15, 2018 to use hfsexplorer, connect your macformatted drive to your windows pc and launch hfsexplorer. How to share an external hard drive between mac and windows.
How to format a hard drive to work on mac and pc youtube. Jan 23, 2020 i hope you enjoyed my article on how to make an external hard drive compatible with mac and pc without reformatting. Apr 29, 2020 recoverit data recovery is the best external hard drive recovery program, it can easily and effectively to help you recover lost or accidentally deleted files from hard disk drive, or other external storage device. Sep 26, 2018 need to format an external hard drive for mac and windows. Best hard drives and storage devices for 2020 cnet. Because the two systems use different file systems for storage. We also stock portable external hard drives and portable usb hard drives. Your faithful mac creates the partitions on your external hard drive. Best external hard drives for macs in 2020 techradar. How to check a macs free hard drive space macworld.
It will automatically locate the connected drive, and you can load it. Both operating systems use different formats for reading and writing to a. These days, you can get an external hard disk with gargantuan amounts of storage for cheap. At walmart, we carry a number of hard drives from many top. A vast majority of video production will be done on a mac or windows operating system, so we arent going to cover linux. Even though most people associate formatting with system installation, there are many other reasons why you might want to format your hard drive. But some people find some hard drive space is missing without knowing the exact reason. This nfc makes it easy to unlock the drive by using the nfc card that is supplied and tapping it on the case of the drive. 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. Want to format a hard drive for mac and pc compatibility.
Now you would be able to use the external hard disk on both the computers. How to format a hard drive for both windows and mac laptop mag. The 8 best external hard drives and ssds for mac and pc. How to solve an external hard drive not showing up on windows windows includes multiple tools for diagnosing a hard drive, but it, unfortunately, makes them difficult to access. Store in icloud selects icloud photos and optimize mac storage. You want external hard drive where both the mac and the pc can. Its fast 540 mbs read and write speeds are more than enough to transfer any file. How to install windows 10 on your mac using a boot camp. How to solve an external hard drive not showing up in 2020.
Windows will format the drive as exfat and youll be able to use the drive on both windows and mac. Apr 18, 2019 the process for wiping a drive in macos is no harder than windows, though it will be slightly different depending on the type of drive you plan to wipe. Aug 10, 2018 disk formatting is the process of prepping a storage device like a hard drive, ssd, thumb drive usb flash drive, etc to store information, which will erase the existing data forever. Step 2 now, go to the applications folder on your mac, and launch the disk utility from the utilities folder. But before we jump straight in, there are some things you need to have in place before you begin. Buying an external hard drive for your mac is not all that different from buying one for your windows pc, except for one very important complication. Click the file menu and select load file system from device. This is because both mac os and windows will hold some information in its memory. Desktopbound and portable platterbased storage has never been cheaper. External hard drive for mac and pc with data interchangeable. Seagate stgx400 portable 1tb external hard drive hdd. The process for wiping a drive in macos is no harder than windows, though it will be slightly different depending on the type of drive you plan to. Best external drives for mac and pc interchangeable 2020.
Disk utility cant detect or repair all problems that a disk may have. Dec 22, 2019 how to format external hard drive mac. Ever since i wrote about installing windows 10 on a mac earlier this year, ive received tons of questions about installing windows 10 on an external drive using boot camp drivers. Samsung portable ssd t3 a futureproof portable drive.
In this video tutorial, i show you how to easily format an external hard drive to work on both a mac and a pc. Repair a storage device in disk utility on mac apple support. There will be no space wasted by protected mac partitions. The 8 best external hard drives and ssds for mac and pc users in. Follow the steps to format your toshiba hard drive for mac step 1 connect your toshiba hard drive to your mac using a compatible medium and make sure the connection remains uninterrupted. I hope you enjoyed my article on how to make an external hard drive compatible with mac and pc without reformatting.
The prior generation mac wd hdd was much nicer in a. Lacie 4tb rugged raid pro usbc hard drive with builtin sd card reader next gallery image. I have a pc running windows 7 professional with a 250gb ssd for the system and some programs, and an additional 3tb sata hard disk drive. Compare portable, usb and external hard drive models for office and home and shop online. The below part consists of all possible solutions to the unconsciously filling up disk space in windows 10, 8, and 7. Mar 16, 2020 then, once you know those are safe, you can try doing a full drive clone with something like easeus todo backup free windows or carbon copy cloner mac. How to format external hard drives for mac and windows. With support for usbc and the new 2tb capacity, the portable ssd t3 is the ultimate portable storage device if you can afford it. Free up space deleting junk files using storage sense. Partition a hard drive for macos time machine and windows. However, you have to reformat the drive to make it functional with your mac computer. Disk utility can fix certain disk problemsfor example, multiple apps quit unexpectedly, a file is corrupted, an external device doesnt work properly, or your computer wont start up. This screen appears after the computer shuts down and begins to restart. While you can physically connect a mac hard drive to a windows pc, the pc cannot read the drive unless thirdparty software is installed.
When choosing the best external hard drive for you, your main consideration should be storage capacity. Disk formatting is the process of prepping a storage device like a hard drive, ssd, thumb drive usb flash drive, etc to store information, which will erase the existing data forever. Steps on how to recover data from external hard drive. Find low everyday prices and buy online for delivery or instore pickup. 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. Not only is the caldigit tuff a rugged hard drive designed to survive extreme conditions, its also a terrific. Just drag and drop to get set up, connect the portable hard drive to a computer for automatic recognitionno software requiredand enjoy plug and play simplicity with the.
Gtechnology portable external hard drive 2tb from the sleek design to the preformatting, this terabytesized drive is perfect for mac users who need a little extra space and offers the transfer rate up to 140mbs for accessing all your files. 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. You can get an apple external hard drive in any size ranging from about 60gb to 20tb, depending on your needs. I havent used this specific program in a long time, and ive always used sperate hard drives for winmac, but if the stuff not in the yellow outline isnt osx stuff you should be fine deleting it. Use the wizard to create a partition with the ntfs or fat32 file system. On windows 10, storage sense offers an easy way to delete junk files from the system drive as well as for secondary and external drives. This small compact ssd drive from samsung comes with both a usbc to usbc cable and a usbc to usba, meaning its perfect to use with your macbook or mac. How to format drive with compatible file system for mac and. External hard drive compatible with mac and pc without. The prior generation mac wd hdd was much nicer in a silverish sleek enclosure. The best external hard drives are fast, dependable and easy to use.
In macos mojave or earlier, choose apple menu system preferences, click icloud, then click options next to icloud drive. Wd used to be in my view the leaders in storage solutions. Theyre usually affordable too, and of course, portable. Designed to work with windows or mac computers, this compact external hard drive makes backup a snap. Mar 31, 2020 windows 10 typically lists an external drive as disk 2 along with the next successive alphabetic label if you dont have any other internal diskbased storage. If you have both windows and mac computers in your office, its important to understand their different storage requirements before buying an external hard drive. Mac os journaled is the formatting option for mac and ntfs or msdoc is the. Here are the best mac hard drives and external storage options in 2020. The best external hard drives for mac in 2020 pcmag.
From the block image, it looks like theres other stuff on the drive besides the windows os and programs it contains. Just drag and drop to get set up, connect the portable hard drive to a computer for automatic recognitionno software requiredand enjoy plug and play simplicity with the included 18 inch usb 3. Wed recommend 500gb to start, as that gives you plenty of space to store your files without costing too much money. Windows and mac compatible, the hard drive uses a 256bit aes security feature as well as featuring nfc near field communication.
How to format a hard drive or ssd to erase it forever. Both mac os x and windows allow users to format their hard drives using builtin utilities. Pick up one of our desktop external hard drives or hard drive docking stations today, or shop for one of our new computers. If you reformat your hard drive in fat32 for example, it will work on any system. Dec 26, 2019 samsung portable ssd t3 a futureproof portable drive. This file system is specifically for mac systems and windows cant read this file system. Wd my passport for mac portable external hard drive. How to find and recover missing space on hard drive in windows. Traditional hard disks are the most common options of external drives for mac, but you can also use them as laptop internal hard drives. Most people are using the hard drive and it is one of the main storage media. Need to format an external hard drive for mac and windows. Now connect the external hard drive to windows 8 computer and format it in fat32 file system. 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 an external hard drive for mac and windows. The best external hard drives offer a range of storage space. How to free up storage space on your mac apple support. That said, if you are using both a pc and mac in the workflow, youll need to use a different. The best external hard drives will come in handy for plenty of people working in the creative industries, who often have to store lots of large files, and will soon fill up the hard drive that comes with their mac or pc. This latest hard drive well, its not very aesthetically pleasing. In photos, choose photos preferences, then click icloud. Besides, the solutions can apply to some relevant searches.
You have to set it up correctly before getting starting. To check the total disk space left on your windows 10 device, select file explorer from the taskbar, and then select this pc on the left. Partition hard drive for mac and windows, in 6 easy steps. Connect the external hard drive to your mac and copy the important data to the mac pc.
There are a number of tools that can help you in this regard. You can try them one by one until you resolved the issue entirely. Gamers can also benefit from this model since this wd hard drive can easily expand the storage on xbox one, ps4, and other gaming consoles. They produced fantastic looking external hard drive enclosures and each year i would get a new one in their range. At walmart, we carry a number of hard drives from many top brands, such as seagate, toshiba and western digital. The name varies by mac but it will appear in the left panel. While you have bought this drive, you will find the drive already formatted for your mac or windows system. Can a single external hard drive work on both mac and pc. Whether you go the software or hardware route depends on your situation. The available space on your drive will appear under devices and drives.
The 8 best external hard drives and ssds for mac and pc users. In the main interface, right click the partition on that need. There are many good reasons to buy a quality external hard drive. How to convert a macformatted drive to a windows drive. Lacie 4tb rugged raid pro usbc hard drive lacie 2tb dji copilot boss hard drive previous gallery image.
If you need to use a single external hard drive to format for mac and pc, however. If you follow the steps below and continue to have trouble updating windows because of low disk space, resetting or reinstalling windows. Rightclick in the unallocated space on the initialized disk and select new simple volume. To use hfsexplorer, connect your macformatted drive to your windows pc and launch hfsexplorer. Dec 29, 2015 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. Mar 12, 2018 want to format a hard drive for mac and pc compatibility. Discover the world of external hard drives for mac. Oct 07, 2019 in macos mojave or earlier, choose apple menu system preferences, click icloud, then click options next to icloud drive. For example, hard disk full but no files, external hard drive says its full but its not, my. Recoverit data recovery is the best external hard drive recovery program, it can easily and effectively to help you recover lost or accidentally deleted files from hard disk drive, or other external storage device. The external hard drive is ntfs preformatted for windows.
Then, once you know those are safe, you can try doing a full drive clone with something like easeus todo backup free windows or carbon copy. Windows 10 typically lists an external drive as disk 2 along with the next successive alphabetic label if you dont have any other internal diskbased storage. The drive will now be formatted for use by windows systems. Lacie 4tb rugged raid pro usbc hard drive with builtin sd card reader previous gallery image. When considering external storage for mac, factor in cloud capacities. Convert formatted drive from mac to windows info remo.