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How can I write to a ntfs formatted drive?

I know there are some third party apps for a fee but this seems like a simple enough and popular request that Apple should address. Can you tell me if apple has a solution for this?


I appreciate your help.


Thanks,

John

MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.6.8)

Posted on Oct 14, 2012 5:21 PM

Reply
6 replies

Oct 17, 2012 4:42 PM in response to John G 9

No Apple solution (well, the solution would be for you to only buy Mac stuff and reformat your hard drive to Mac 😉 ).


NTFS drivers for Macs (there may be others):


Paragon NTFS - http://www.paragon-software.com/home/ntfs-mac/ - recommendation: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/4046285?answerId=18708633022#18708633022


Tuxera NTFS 2012.3.2 - http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/33122/tuxera-ntfs


NTFS for Mac OS X 9.5.3 - http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/26288/ntfs-for-mac-os-x


There used to be NTFS-3G which I believe was free, but it looks like it is now Tuxera. Maybe an old version would work (or maybe not).


http://macntfs-3g.blogspot.com/ and http://i.vishalagarwal.com/post/30387627819/ntfs-write-on-lion-or-mountain-lion

Oct 17, 2012 7:10 PM in response to John G 9

Take the data off the drive and format it on the oldest PC you have and use exFAT.


If it's a XP machine and it doesn't have exFAT, it's a free download and install from Microsoft.



Mac's can read/write GUID and MBR partition tables and all Windows formats except NTFS.


NTFS software is a headache as it has to be updated and it costs money, sometimes causes issues, only to be used in a emergency.


Drives, partitions, formatting w/Mac's + PC's

Oct 17, 2012 7:25 PM in response to Limnos

Thanks. This is good I used Tuxera until trial expired. I don't feel it's worth the $$$. If I were to buy something, Paragon seems to be reasonably priced and I also tried temporary license and it worked as good as Tuxera. I did find a free version of NTFS-3G and it returned an error as soon as the USB drive was connected to my MacBook.


I do have a solution that I will post right after I reply to @ds store.

Oct 17, 2012 7:48 PM in response to ds store

@ds store, I was going to go down the exFAT path but decided to do a little more research before spending considerable time to copy off the data, format the drive and copy the data back. exFAT does look to be a good solution and something I will try on the next USB drive that I need to share between Windows and Mac machines.


Here's what I found that works. It's called SixtyFourSwitcher. All it does is provide a Preference Pane to allow you to boot in the 32 bit kernel as opposed to 64 bit or vice versa. It obvously requires a reboot. I switched to 32 bit, rebooted, connected to my NTFS USB hard drive and proceeded to copy files from MacBook to the USB hard drive without any issues. When I finished with the copy, I switched back to 64 bit and rebooted with no issues. Nice little tool to use when needed, and it's FREE!


Here's the link for the download which includes Readme file with excellent information.


http://seiryu.home.comcast.net/~seiryu/sixtyfourswitcher.html

How can I write to a ntfs formatted drive?

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