If I Format An External Hard Drive For Windows, Can It Be Used On Mac OS X And Windows

If I Format An External Hard Drive For Windows, Can It Be Used On Mac OS X And Windows

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Once formatted, you can connect your external hard drive to your Mac and transfer the data to the external drive.

Hard Drive Formatting and Optional Partitioning Step 1 Connect the external hard drive to the Mac using the provided connector cable.

Step 2 Click the Go menu, Utilities and open Disk Utility on your Mac.

Step 3 Select the external disk from the sidebar, and click the Erase tab.

Click Erase. If you want to partition the disk to save any data already on the disk, click the Partition tab, click the button and drag the original partition to resize.

Click the New partition you created, and select ExFat from the Format drop-down list.

Click Apply. Transfer Data Step 1 Connect the external hard drive to your Mac.

Step 2 Drag the files you want to transfer to the external hard drives icon on your desktop.

If the hard drive doesnt appear, click the Finder icon in the Dock and click on the external hard drive in the Devices section.

Step 3 Drag the hard drive icon to the Trash when the files have finished transferring.

Or, open Finder and click the Eject button next to the external hard drive.

If you get a notice that a file copying operation is in progress, click Cancel and wait for it to finish.

Open the external hard drive by clicking the Start button, Computer and selecting your hard drive.

Step 5 Drag the files from the external hard drive onto the Windows computer if you want to save a local copy.

References Apple: Disk Utility 12.x - Format a Disk for Windows Computers Apple: Disk Utility 12.x - Partition a Disk Tips Use the FAT format only for disks that are less than 32GB in size.

Writer Bio Avery Martin holds a Bachelor of Music in opera performance and a Bachelor of Arts in East Asian studies.

As a professional writer, she has written for Education.com, Samsung and IBM.

Martin contributed English translations for a collection of Japanese poems by Misuzu Kaneko.

She has worked as an educator in Japan, and she runs a private voice studio out of her home.

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