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Format Toshiba hard drive for Mac

I bought a Toshiba Canvio Basics hard drive, but it says that it needs to be formatted for Mac. (I hate these things... Why can't they make a HD that is already formatted for a Mac and just needs to be plugged in??)


Anyways, how do I do that?


I found some articles on the net, but it doesn't work for me... First of all the Toshiba is not shown on my desktop when I plug it in... Second, when I go to disc utility it only shows my internal HD and no Toshiba...


Please help! Thanks.

MacBook Air 13″, macOS 10.15

Posted on Oct 7, 2020 7:10 AM

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Posted on Oct 7, 2020 10:20 AM

For Mac external, the usual choice is GPT/GUID partitioning with HFS+ Journaled, most likely. Not HFS+ case-sensitive. If you’re thinking of using that device with Time Machine, it must be HFS+ Journaled.


I wouldn't use the device on both Windows and Mac, as that means using an old and limited format (FAT32), or purchasing and using third-party NTFS support.


For sharing files... If the computers are local and connected to the same network, I’d enable file sharing services, rather than swapping that disk around.

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Oct 7, 2020 10:20 AM in response to bszorad

For Mac external, the usual choice is GPT/GUID partitioning with HFS+ Journaled, most likely. Not HFS+ case-sensitive. If you’re thinking of using that device with Time Machine, it must be HFS+ Journaled.


I wouldn't use the device on both Windows and Mac, as that means using an old and limited format (FAT32), or purchasing and using third-party NTFS support.


For sharing files... If the computers are local and connected to the same network, I’d enable file sharing services, rather than swapping that disk around.

Oct 7, 2020 9:34 AM in response to MrHoffman

Now it shows in both Finder and Disc utility. I think it was not plugged in well before... Have not done any formatting yet... Should I do that even if I can see the drive now in Finder? Also some videos mention to format it as OS X extended journalled for Mac, or as MS-DOS if you want to use it both for Mac and PC... Should I choose the first or the second option? Thanks.

Format Toshiba hard drive for Mac

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