External Harddisk not usable in Mac

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Level 1

146 points

External Harddisk not usable in Mac

I use the external hard drive with windows before and my Mac can read the files in it when i connected them together but i can not create new folders in it and etc. I think this is also the reason why some of my foreign song titles are not showing in iTunes, they become codes. usually when i use itunes in Windows if the file is in the library folder when i change song title in itunes the actual file name would change too. But when i pluged it into my mac many of my foreign song titles are in codes, but (luckily) the actual file name was not affected. which is a good thing because i don't want my music folder to be messed up but that also means that itunes, or should i say my MacBook does not have the ability to make changes on my external harddrive. what can i do? do i have to format my harddrive because it was used with windows before?

MacBook, Mac OS X (10.4.6)

Posted on Oct 18, 2006 3:24 PM

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Answer 1

Best reply

Mr Lizard

Level 2

256 points

Oct 18, 2006 3:53 PM in response to Wayne Choi

Don't panic!

If you were using the hard drive with Windows, it is likely that is it formatted using NTFS.

NTFS is a file system only used by Windows, and is proprietary. In other words, if companies other than Microsoft wish to use the NTFS file system, they must pay royalties to Microsoft to do so.

Macs are compatible with a wide array of various file systems, but due to the proprietary nature of NTFS, it cannot write to a disc formatted this way. It will, however, be able to read from it.

The solution: firstly, copy the contents of the drive onto the Mac's built in drive. It is very important that you don't miss this step out!

Next, we are going to format the drive using a more modern file system called HFS+. This file system is what Macs use by default.

To do this: open up Disc Utility (you'll find it in the Utilities folder inside Applications)

You should see the drive on the left hand side of the Disc Utility window.

Select the drive, and then click 'partition' (along the top)

From the Format drop-down menu, choose 'Mac OS Extended (Journaled)'. This is the posh name for HFS+.

There is a button near the bottom right of the window called 'partition'. Clicking this will erase the contents of the hard drive, and will format the drive using the HFS+ file system.

Once complete, you can drag the contents of the drive back from your Mac. Solved!

Note that Windows does not support HFS+. However, if you need to use the drive with Windows, then 3rd party software is available that will provide Windows with this ability.

Let me know how you get on.

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Answer 2

JoeyR

Level 6

8,305 points

Oct 18, 2006 3:59 PM in response to Mr Lizard

If you format your external drive in HFS, it will not be readable under Windows at all. If you want to be able to use the external drive under both Windows and OS X, you should format your drive as FAT32. As mentioned, be sure you copy your data over to the drive in your notebook first so you don't loose it. You can copy it back over after you format it. You can use either Windows or OS X to do the formatting... whichever you're more comfortable with.

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Answer 3

Mr Lizard

Level 2

256 points

Oct 18, 2006 4:22 PM in response to JoeyR

Yup, FAT32 works a charm, but it lacks some great features of HFS+, such as fewer file name limitations. Also, FAT32 cannot hold a file if it over 2GB in size. This can prove a problem when working in video.

But you're right, FAT32 works fine under both OS's 😉

Using 3rd party software will give Windows the facility to read/write to HFS+.

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