I have a Lacie d2 Quadra 1tb External Hard Drive. I had it for years on a Mac. But unfortunately it bit the dust and I decided to get a PC. Now either because of time, corruption or because it may have been formatted for a Mac when I plug it into my PC I cant access it. How to Format an External Hard Drive. In this Article: On Windows On Mac Community Q&A This wikiHow teaches you how to change an external (USB) hard drive's format on Windows and Mac computers.
Bought this 1tb toshiba external hard drive. Put all of my WINDOWS files on it. Then i bought a MAC. Nothing was working. I put all my mac files on the external hard drive, DELETED EVERYTHING OFF THE COMPUTER. Then realized that i couldn't get it back of the hard drive b/c of format.
SO, now i want to reformat the hard drive. Its asking me to ERASE in order to format. My question is. Will i loose all the WINDOW FILES that i have already put on this hard drive if i reformat it to work on a mac thanks for the help!
Today I bought a 3TB My Book external hard drive. The only reason I need this is to move my 2,000+ pictures and 100+ videos off my Mac and keep them safe.
These pictures and videos are filling up my memory and I can't seem to do much else with the whole 10GB I have free. Setting up and backing up My Book with Time Machine seemed to be a breeze and I can see all of the items on it that I need to.
Honestly, I didn't want to back up my whole computer, I didn't need to. All I need off the Mac is the pictures and videos and I must be able to move them safely to another computer, if I want to. So here's my problem, before I even attempted to clean off all the pictures and videos from my Mac, I wanted to make sure I could see them on the drive from my husbands Lenovo laptop which runs on Windows 8. The device is recognized when plugged in but in no way can he open the external hard drive to see any pictures or videos, or anything for that matter. At this point, I'm very frustrated, I don't have enough money to spend an arm and a leg on hard drive. But obviously, you get what you pay for.
Is there any drive (I want something that's at least 2TB for future use) that will be able to transfer my pictures and videos from my Mac to a Windows computer, and vice versa? Is there any way that I can get this My Book to work with Windows 8 now that I've used it for my Mac? If not, it's going back ASAP.
Yes, you can ignore some of the responses here. While we may not agree with what you want to do, here is the solution to your question.
We are going to reformat your new EXT so both Mac and Win machines will be able to use it. Connect the drive to your Mac, open disk utility Go to the partiton tab and select '1'. Format should be ExFAT - and in options select MBR Format the drive Copy your pictures, videos, etc back onto the drive. Connect it to your Win machine and now you should be able to use this drive there, too. If you used Time Machine to back the photos and videos to the external and you now delete them from the Mac then Time Machine can delete them from the backup.
A backup is not the way to save files to an external disk drive No the disk with the Time Machine backup should be formatted for a Mac and the PC will not be able to use it What you really need is to an external disk that you copy the files to for storage Then another disk for backup Depending on how your photos and video are stored and managed on your Mac it may be possible for the storage disk drive to be formatted so that it can be accessed by both the Mac and PC. Personally I usually find those solutions to be less then ideal for either comupter so I suggest that you don't do that. Windows does not acknowledge the existence of ANY other computer systems. It does not read any file Systems but its own. Using Windows as the arbiter of whether these files were copied corrctly makes no sense. If you want to expand the space you use on your MacBook Pro, think of an External drive as an Extension drive, that is sometimes connected and in use, and sometimes not. You can drag and drop files there, and Mac OS X can see them edit them, and even make Backup copies of them using Time Machine.
And you can disconnect that drive and leave it off for a week, then re-connect it next week and use it as if it were part of your MacBook. But maybe you should have a more modest drive for an extension drive, and use that big 3TB as your Time Machine drive. Huge storage, low cost, high quality, very small and portable. BEST FOR THE COST, Toshiba 'tiny giant' 15mm thick 2TB drive (have several of them, lots of storage in tiny package) $100 best options for the price, and high quality HD: Quality 1TB drives are $50 per TB on 3.5' or $65 per TB on 2.5' Perfect 1TB for $68 Nice 500gig for $50. Ultraslim perfect for use with a notebook.This one is the BEST portable external HD available that money can buy: HGST Touro Mobile 1TB USB 3.0 External Hard Drive $88 Most storage experts agree on the Hitachi 2.5' Hitachi is the winner in hard drive reliability survey: Hitachi manufacturers the safest and most reliable hard drives, according to the Storelab study. Of the hundreds of Hitachi hard drives received, not a single one had failed due to manufacturing or design errors. Adding the highest average lifespans and the best relationship between failures and market share, Hitachi can be regarded as the winner.
It was the only option given upon starting the external drive You made a choice, and it was the wrong choice. The correct choice is IGNORE. Then when the system is fully operational, Launch Disk Utility.
Erase the drive. Make sure it has GUID partition Map. Partition it to one partition, Mac OS Extended (journaled). When completed, Quit Disk Utility. A new blank drive should appear on your desktop (unless you have that option turned off in Finder preferences). Make a new Folder. Drag whatever you please into it.
Yes, you can ignore some of the responses here. While we may not agree with what you want to do, here is the solution to your question. We are going to reformat your new EXT so both Mac and Win machines will be able to use it.
Connect the drive to your Mac, open disk utility Go to the partiton tab and select '1'. Format should be ExFAT - and in options select MBR Format the drive Copy your pictures, videos, etc back onto the drive. Connect it to your Win machine and now you should be able to use this drive there, too. Thank you so much!
Especially in being so kind and offering quick and efficient advice. I got my Mac back in September and still don't know much about it.
Switching operating systems has been a bit confusing. I had attempted to drop all of my pictures on to a 32GB flash drive and could never get more that 20 pictures on it, my husband picked up a new one last night and we were able to drop the picture folder from the external drive onto the flash drive and then copy them onto his Lenovo. I really just wanted my pictures off my Mac and on a device that could move them from computer to computer if need be. Will be doing the same with videos and keeping the My Book to back up my Mac. Again, thank you!
And if I ever feel the need to reformat My Book, I'll just refer back to your post. Apple Footer. This site contains user submitted content, comments and opinions and is for informational purposes only. Apple may provide or recommend responses as a possible solution based on the information provided; every potential issue may involve several factors not detailed in the conversations captured in an electronic forum and Apple can therefore provide no guarantee as to the efficacy of any proposed solutions on the community forums. Apple disclaims any and all liability for the acts, omissions and conduct of any third parties in connection with or related to your use of the site.
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