solution for NTFS formatted drives that works

Once you have mounted the drive, you can make an alias of the drive to any location of your choice. The alias will only work when the drive is mounted. To do this, click and drag the drive in the Volumes folder, and then hold the Option and Command keys while you are still dragging, and you will see the mouse cursor change to a small curved arrow. In this mode, drop the alias wherever you would like (e.g., your Desktop) and you can then access it from there.

The commands you've been describing only set the system up to recognize that one drive as a read and write NTFS filesystem. Once set up, whenever you attach that drive the system will be able to read and write to it, but it simply will not show in the Finder sidebar or on the Desktop.

Creating the alias like I mentioned is a workaround to this limitation, and you should be able to access the drive directly through the alias. You can make the alias also by dragging the drive to your sidebar, but there will be some differences, such as the alias staying even when the drive is unmounted, and not being able to right-click the alias and unmount the drive.

Topher Kessler wrote:

Creating the alias like I mentioned is a workaround to this limitation, and you should be able to access the drive directly through the alias.

That is a neat trick. Thanks!

What works best for me is creating a shortcut to the drive in the sidebar with Cmd+t. That way, I even get the button to eject the drive. The only difference now is that the link stays there even if the drive is ejected.

I don't have windows pcs or an apple tv to test this, sorry. I'll test whether the SMB network sharing works with linux as soon as I have time.

Patience, young padawan. I'll test it in a few hours. I can set up the external drive for sharing in the sharing options, but I cannot test if it acually works at the moment.

Yes

XDvenom wrote:

have u done this before on ur own mac computer with a NTFS drive

I recommend that if you are going to be heavily using this drive for sharing services and other details, that you consider using a more supported filesystem format like Apple's HFS+. This will ensure not only speed but proper stability as well.