MacBook Air won't erase hard drive

I'll include specs at the bottom.


I got a 4.2TB hard drive, and no matter what I try, my MacBook just gives me this:


Sometimes, it refuses to read the disk entirely, and the initialize button seemingly does absolutely nothing:


I've tried different schemes, and security options, but the formatting has always stayed the same, Mac OS Extended (Journaled). Anyone know what to do?


Laptop Specs (that I can see):

  • MacOS Version: 10.15.7
  • Model Year: 2020
  • Processor: 1.1 GHz Dual-Core Intel Core i3
  • Memory: 8 GB 3733 MHz LPDDR4X
  • Graphics: Intel Iris Plus Graphics 1536 MB


Hard Drive Specs:

  • Storage Capacity: 4000GB
  • Hard Disk Interface: USB 3.1
  • Connectivity Technology: USB (The port on the drive itself is USB-C)
  • Brand: Suryas
  • Hard Disk Size: 4TB


MacBook Air

Posted on Nov 17, 2022 3:13 PM

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Nov 18, 2022 5:17 AM in response to lake272

When this happens to me, and sadly it does, I use my one remaining Windows box to format the drive NTFS. Your Mac will be able to see the NTFS drive and erase it.


If that doesn't work, use GPartEd and erase the drive with it. You'll need to download the app and burn an optical disk but it's never failed to erase and format an undamaged drive for me.

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MacBook Air won't erase hard drive

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