To use the same external hard disk on a Windows computer and a macOS you need to choose the right file system. Follow our step by step guide.
If you like to bring your favorite music or the photos and videos you are fond of with you, but you prefer not to leave these files on the internal memory of your smartphone so as not to take up precious space, most likely use at least one USB stick. The same is true if you have the habit of bringing your work (and files) home. If you bring lots of files, music, videos and photos with you, then you probably need an external hard drive. But if you have a PC at home and a Mac at work (or vice versa), how do you do it?
And if the photos, videos or files, you have to share them with those who use macOS while you have Windows (or, again, vice versa) how to use the same external hard drive or USB stick? As you know (or how you will have noticed), in fact, a hard disk or a stick used with Windows is not recognized or read by the Mac (and vice versa). Fortunately, it is a less serious problem than it seems: being able to use an external hard drive on Windows and macOS is simpler than imagined.
Guilt of the File System
One of the many incompatibilities between Mac and Windows comes from the different file systems used: APFS or HFS Plus on Mac, FAT32, ExFAT or NTFS on Windows. If we talk about recent computers, it is almost certain that the systems used are APFS and NTFS. A disk formatted with APFS can neither be read nor written by Windows while an NTFS disk can neither be read nor written by a Mac. The old FAT32 file system and the most recent ExFAT (which is an extended version: Extended FAT) can be read and written by both operating systems, so if the same external hard drive or USB stick (but also an SD card) must be used on both Windows and Mac a first solution is to choose one of these two file systems to format them.
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Which one to choose between FAT32 and ExFAT
However, these two standards have technical limitations to consider. With FAT32 the maximum size of a file cannot exceed 4 GB, you cannot create partitions larger than 32 GB and each folder can contain a maximum of one thousand files. ExFAT does not have these limits, but compared to NTFS or APFS it does not have some useful features to reinforce data security like “journaling”, a system that keeps track of changes made to individual files. To exchange files between Mac and PC via a USB flash drive, or an SD card, therefore, FAT32 can be a good choice only if its technical limits are not exceeded. Otherwise, the best choice is to format the media with ExFAT. To exchange data with an external HD, however, almost always the best choice is to format it with ExFAT.
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How to create a hard disk for use with Windows and Mac
Whatever your choice, both Windows and macOS have integrated the necessary tools to format correctly, and with the file system you have chosen, your hard drive, your key or the memory card. In the case of Windows, we are talking about the tool “Disk Management “, while on macOS it is called “Disk Utility”. In both cases, however, always remember that the formatting of the disc will permanently delete all the data it contains and then it must be done before uploading the files, photos,
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How to format your external Drive in Mac?
1. Connect the hard drive to your Mac
2. Open disk utility 3. Select the drive you want to format.
4. Click Erase.
If you have no plan to use the drive for Time Machine, skip steps 5 to 11 below and continue with step 12.
5. Now give a descriptive name to your drive and leave the default settings: OS X Extended format and GUID partition map. These will format the drive in OS X’s HFS+ file type so it will be compatible with Time Machine.
6. Press the Erase button and OS X will format the drive.
7. With the drive selected in Disk Utility, press the Partition button.
8. Now enter the amount of disk space you want to set aside for Time Machine.
9. Click Apply.
10. Select the new untitled partition so you can format it as exFAT for use with both Mac and Windows.
11. Click Erase.
12. Give a name to the partition you just have created and select exFAT for the format.
13. Click Erase to finish.
You can now use your exFAT-formatted partition on both Windows and Mac.
How to Format your External Drive in Windows?
1. Connect the drive to your PC with Windows OS.
2. Now open the Disk Management tool. Just type “disk format” or “disk management” in the search option or you can go to Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Create and format hard disk partitions.
3. Right-click on the external drive’s partition or unallocated space that you want to format and choose the New Simple Volume option.
4. Follow the wizard to choose a volume size.
5. Assign a drive letter.
6. Choose exFAT as the file system in the Format Partition screen.
7. Give the volume a new name.
8. Click Next.
9. Click Finish.
Windows will format the drive as exFAT and you’ll be able to use the drive on both Windows and Mac.