HT201250 external hard drive Mac to Windows

I have had a mac of which I just killed the hard drive. I was backing it up with an external hard drive using I believe time machine.
I have brought a new computer which is a windows 8 operating system but I can not open the external hard drive. How do I open it, so I can then put my files onto my new computer??

Install the MacDrive trial on the PC.
(77797)

Similar Messages

PC back up files -- External hard drive -- Mac?

I just reformatted the hard drive on my Mac Book (running Mac OS X 10.5.8), and plan to use it as my primary machine. But I've got system back-up files from an old PC on an external hard drive (was running Windows 7) that I'd like to transfer over if possible. Mostly .mp3 files and documents. The hard drive itself is compatible with both platforms.
Is this even possible?

Is this even possible?
Yes. Hook it up and copy the files over.

External hard drive for both windows and mac

hello, all - just bought a western digital 500gb my book premium edition external hard drive. will be using for both pc and macbook, not necessarily to share files (though i may on occasion), but rather as a backup. been researching the discussion boards and concluded that i should use it as pre-formatted fat32. few questions...
1) if i do use to share files, from what i understand i will be able to read windows files with my mac but i can't read mac files with windows (unless i have macdrive installed). is this correct?
2) since mac can read/write to fat 32, is it necessary to partition the drives and keep the files separated? i talked to a "computer guy" earlier today and he said i should consider having two completely separate external hard drives as having files from two different operating systems on the same drive could cause major problems for both... i didn't really believe him.
3) i have seen different posts stating using fat32 format for mac limits file size to 4gb. another post said 32gb. which is right? i have os is 10.4.7 if that makes a difference.
thanks in advance for any insight.

2 - i don't mind partitioning at all. but he strongly suggested not even partitioning but using two completely separate hard drives. yeah, the 500gb was a bit overkill, so if i can use it for both as opposed to one and buying an additional, i'd rather.
2/3 - if i partition, is it best to divide it into ntfs and hfs+? or should i keep the pc portion fat32? if the mac portion is hfs+, can i store any size file? i have videos that are anywhere from 10-20gb, and i'd like to get them off my computer and into the external drive.
thanks.

External Hard drives Mac OS and Windows

I have a question on external hard drives. I am looking for an external drive that will work with both my Mac and Windows xp pro. I remember that Mac used to be able to read windows format but not vise versa. I know that thumb drives switch back and forth with no problem but it seems that hard drives do not. I went to the store and was told and the boxes state that the windows drives must be reformatted to work with Mac and the WD Mac drive said that it must be reformatted to work in Windows, (as I expected). Is this something new between the OS's or something to do with the drive sizes? Any help would be appreciated as I would like to be able to move large files, usually movies, between the two formats by simply moving the external drive from one to the other.
Thank you

If you reformat that flash drive to use +Mac OS X Extended (Journaled)+, it will probably work. But then, you would not be able to use it on the Windows PC (until you reformatted it again).
then probably the best option although more expensive will be to buy an ethernet drive and connect to my router.
Or maybe you can do a direct transfer from PC to Mac or Mac to PC over wired Ethernet, and put the extra storage drive on the Mac or PC, formatted to be optimal for the respective connected OS. If your PC has gigabit Ethernet (and your router is has gigabit ports), it should be fairly fast. Make sure the cables are rated Cat-5e or better.
Wow another Power Mac 8100 user who added a G3 card to it.
Still a machine that is set up and runs fine, for using my old Mac OS 9 programs. I bought mine used after it was already a few years old, but it was used as my primary Mac longer than any other machine before or since. It stayed relevant for a long long time.

Can't transfer files from a mac external hard drive to a windows hard drive

Today I went to a friends house to try and take some of his music from his external hard drive. So we plugged his mac converted hard drive into my computer, which is operating on windows 7, and my computer could not read that anything was there. So we plugged in my windows converted into his Macbook Pro, and his computer was able to read it, but for some reason, we could not transfer files from his hard drive to mine.
I was just wondering if I am doing something wrong, or if it could be because I am using a hard drive that I bought in China, and any information would be great.

NTFS is readable in Mac OS, but can't be written to.
HFS+ is not readable in Windows, though Apple now has a (somewhat problematic and buggy at times) service to allow Windows on mac to read HFS+ to make it easier and more convenient.
There are drivers (free and commercial) to add the ability to read and write to each.

External Hard Drive - Migrating from Windows to MAC

Hi -
Just bought myself an iMAC. I have an external hard drive connected to my XP laptop.
Can I read from and write to this drive?
Do I need to reformat the drive (and lose the files in the process)?
I checked the archives, but couldn't find any posting that directly asked this question. Apparently if the drive is FAT32 formatted, I shouldn't have any issues. What if it is not?
Thanks

I was in the same situation as sunahag and the external drive worked fine...for awhile. One day it froze up the iMac so I disconnected the drive and rebooted the iMac. iMac works fine but haven't be able to get the external drive to work with the iMac again. When I connect the external it won't run (indicator which is normally green turns red). Still works with the Windows XP laptop.
Any suggestions, I still need to get more data off the external.

How can I transfer files off an external hard drive formatted for windows?

I just bought my first mac (yay!) and am trying to transfer my files off of my old pc. The problem is that I stored all my personal files on an external hard drive, which is of course formatted for windows. My mac will open it, but it is "read only." I tried plugging it back into my pc and using the Migration Assistant to transfer my files over, but it was not detected (rest of the pc was).
However, the second time I tried plugging it in to my pc, it told me it would need to be formatted first. Obviously my mac has changed something on it, and now all my personal files are on a hard drive that is unusable by either my old pc or my new mac!
Any suggestions would be appreciated! Heads up though, I am not especially computer literate, and my pc needs to stay intact as the husband needs it and some of the programs on it for school. Also, I have a second external hard drive that is brand new with nothing on it, if that will come in handy.
Thanks!

Format the extra HDD to EXFAT as previously indicated. There are two ways that can use to transferr the data.
1. Connect both drives to the PC and the copy the files to the newly formatted (EXFAT) drive from the HDD with the data . Then connect the EXFAT drive to the MBP and transfer the data to same.
2. Connect both drives to the MBP and open DISK UTILITY>RESTORE. Drag the drive with the data on it to the 'Source' field. Drag the EXFAT drive to the 'Destination' field. Click on the 'Restore' butt is on. After the transfer has been completed, close DISK UTILITY and place the data on the MBP where you want it.
Ciao.

Help with using external hard drive to boot windows on PC

Hi,
I'm not sure if this is in the right place, so apologies in advance if not. I've looked around the internet for a good while now, and I haven't found anyone in my exact position.
My PC's hard drive (running Windows 7) recently died; long story short, I am attempting to reinstall windows. The only other computer I have is this MacBook Pro, on which I have an .iso file of Windows 7. So I want to use my external hard drive (WD 500GB "MyBook") as a boot device so that I can install Windows onto my new internal hard drive.
The problem I am having is that, well, nothing seems to be working. Every time I try to load the .iso onto my external hard drive and boot my PC with it, either a blank screen appears or it says "missing operating system".
I have made sure that the BIOS is running the external hard drive as its boot priority.
I have tried using Disk Utility to partition the external drive, then using 'Restore' to load the .iso onto the partition, to no avail.
I have tried simply dropping the extracted .iso files onto the hard drive, this doesn't work.
I have also tried changing the file system of the external hard drive using the 'Erase' feature (NTFS-3G (using an addon), FAT32, exFAT, all of the others), but I notice that whenever I use Restore after doing this, the file system seems to return to Mac OS Extended, which might be why it isn't booting up on my PC. Is there any way I can succesfully partition the external hard drive in a format that will allow Windows 7 to boot (such as NTFS?), and is Disk Utility even the right program to do this?
If you want any more information from me, please let me know and I'll do my best to provide it - I'm not the most advanced mac user in the world, but I've spent days trying to fix this problem and nothing, no combination of anything, seems to work at all. So any help will be greatly appreciated!
Thanks

Here is a quick suggestion for you:
Download Virtual Box (free PC Emulator for Mac) and install Windows 7 on your Mac (don't worry about activating it yet, as you don't need to keep it more than a few hours). You can tell Virtual Box to use the ISO file as the DVD drive for your virtual Windows computer, so no need to burn a disk.
Search Google for creating a bootable USB installer for Windows 7. I found a link that gave good instructions on how to do this using DiskPart.
Follow the instructions to make the bootable USB stick for installing Windows 7 using your virtual machine you created above.
Use the USB stick to install Windows on your new PC.
Remove the virtual Windows machine from your Mac.
Remove Virtual Box from your Mac.
I found a set of instructions and built an installable USB stick last night that worked great for installing Windows 7 Pro (64 bit) onto my older ThinkPad I had sitting at home. The USB installer also installs in about half the time as a DVD install. The only reason I have you create the virtual Windows PC is that all of the instructions for makeing the Windows install USB stick are written assuming that you already have access to a running Windows PC. By doing this install, you have up to 3 days before you would need to activate it and you can build the installer USB stick and remove teh virtual computer long before that.

External hard drive - mac specific or generic?

While I was browsing external hard drives I noticed that there was one that said it was specifically for Mac - I think it was Western Digital. So I was wondering is there a reason to pay extra for a Mac specific external hard drive, or just to use a standard one?
My current WD one is OK (other than the error -36 which means I can't actually copy anything to it without a lot of mucking around) and I'm not really interested in any 'special features' that might come with them, I just use it for archiving & backup.

The upgrade to OSX 10.6.3 (available today) may fix your -36 error, sleepydwarf. It is amongst the items listed as addressed by it - see http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4014
There are two reasons why some drives tend to be classified as "Mac drives".
Firstly, for best performance on a Mac the drive should be formatted using either the GUID or Apple Partition Scheme, and the HFS (extended) file system. This lets you deal with files over 4Gb in size, provides faster and more reliable operation than FAT32 , etc etc. It also allows you to easily install OSX on the drive from your OS DVD if you wish to, so that you can boot from it.
I presume the WD drives are provided in this format. (Though you can always reformat a drive that isn't when you get it simply by using Disc Utility, of course)
Secondly, WD , for example, often install additional software on their drives for automated back up purposes etc. Generally this stuff is Windows only and can cause problems when the drive is used on a Mac. Sometimes it makes them next to useless as boot drives etc.
I suspect that WD , in this case , are reacting to the huge amount of criticism that has come their way when people try to use their external offerings on Macs (to the point where many of us strongly recommend against people purchasing them these days).
Another thing that matters when choosing a drive for Macs, though, is the interface itself. Sure, Macs can use a USB drive, but for an external drive FW400 is substantially faster, and FW800 simply blows USB away when it comes to transfer speeds. If you are shopping for a drive it is well worth the extra in most situations to get one that uses FW800.
The favourite external drives of most of the long term users here are the "OWC Mercury" range - see http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/firewire/ They are sold under other brand names in different parts of the world (In Australia they usually go by under the "Pleiades" brand name - not sure which hunk of the globe you are in) . I have five of them, and couldn't recommend them highly enough. You can either buy them with the drive installed, or add a drive of your own choosing. Quiet, cool, extremely reliable, and easy to update with a new drive when larger ones come along at lower prices (as they inevitably do).
Make sure you take a look at them if you are drive shopping. They beat the pants off the offerings from other , better known, makers.
Cheers
Rod

External hard drive & MAC!!!! HELP

I connected my external hard drive (which I have been using with my windows PC the past years) to my Macbook Pro. It showed up as a device on the MAC but wasn't showing up any of the files so i unplugged it and tried it in my PC! Now my PC won't even recognize the drive. WHY? Did I delete all the files from the drive??? HELP pls. I neeeeeeed the files that were on it.

To delete files from your external HDD, attach it to your MBP and drag the unwanted files to trash and then empty trash.
Then you select the files that you want to transfer by 'drag and drop' to the external HDD and trash the files on your MBP.
Ciao.

External hard drive mac to pc?

My computer is running slow so I purchased an external hard drive to transfer my photos to. Is it possible to open these photos on an PC?

Windows does not acknowledge that there are any other Operating Systems. So using a Mac OS Extended drive requires third-party software on the Windows machine. MacDrive comes to mind.
You can format that drive using Windows Ex-FAT, and then both Mac OS X and Windows machines can read and write it.
Windows New Technolgy File System (NTFS) can be read on a Mac, but not written without third-party software. Paragon NTFS for the Mac comes to mind.

External Hard Drive/Mac & PC

I've read some of the posts on this topic and want to be sure I'm not messing this up.
I want to buy an external hard drive, but I want to use it on both my iMac and my wife's PC. I've noticed that the instrux for the Western Digital drives talk about formatting the HD for either/or, which would seem to be problematic.
So the two questions I have are:
-Does the external drive NEED to be formatted?
-Are there any issues overall with using the hard drive this way?
Thanks,
Steve
20" iMac Intel Core Duo Mac OS X (10.4.8)

Yes, the external drive needs to be formatted. However, to use the drive on both the Mac and a PC the entire drive must be formatted for the PC. PCs cannot read or write Mac disks. OS X can read and write MSDOS formatted disks (but not NTFS formatted disks which are read-only to OS X.)
Use Disk Utility to prep the external drive. Open DU and select the external drive's main entry (mfgr.'s ID and drive size) from the left side list. Click on the Partition tab in the DU main window. Set the number of partitions to one (1) equal in size to the full capacity of the drive. Click on the Options button and select the Master Boot Record partition scheme from the available choices and then click on the OK button. Set the format type to MSDOS (FAT32) then click on the Partition button. Wait for the volume to mount on the Desktop.
Note that OS X and MSDOS use different filesystems. MSDOS does not handle the long file names supported by OS X. Some Mac files contain special resource forks that will be lost when files are saved to an MSDOS formatted disk. If you plan to save Mac data it's a good idea to archive the files before transferring them to an MSDOS formatted drive.
You also cannot use an MSDOS formatted drive as a boot device for OS X, so you cannot clone OS X to an external drive formatted for MSDOS.
Why reward points?(Quoted from Discussions Terms of Use.)
The reward system helps to increase community participation. When a community member gives you (or another member) a reward for providing helpful advice or a solution to their question, your accumulated points will increase your status level within the community.
Members may reward you with 5 points if they deem that your reply is helpful and 10 points if you post a solution to their issue. Likewise, when you mark a reply as Helpful or Solved in your own created topic, you will be awarding the respondent with the same point values.

Setting Up New External Hard Drive to Backup Windows and OSX

I've just ordered a Western Digital My Book Home Edition 500GB external hard drive from Amazon for £79.17 (c/w 1m eSATA to eSATA cable and shipping in the UK). For the time being, I intend to use it mainly for backup. My MacBook3,1 has a 149.05GB internal drive, which is nearly full. I'd used PC's for more than twenty years before rare financial circumstances enabled me to take the plunge and migrate to the Intel-based MacBook last year. Although the migration process hasn't been without teething troubles, I'm glad I've got a Mac and pleased to say I now feel as comfortable using it as I used to feel with PC's. (But it has taken a year of concentrated effort.) The relevance of this is that I have an awful lot of work in old Windows-based programs, which I need to keep backed-up and accessible. The MacBook's internal hard drive currently has 87.88GB dedicated to the Macintosh HD and 60.86GB dedicated to Windows (Vista, Business edition).
Could you advise me, please: how should I set up the new hard drive with a view to using it to backup the Mac with Time Machine while dedicating a partition for Windows? Actually, I have another desktop with Windows XP, which I'd also like to back up. That hard drive (the XP machine's) is 80GB. Presumably, I'll need to set up partitions for: 1) Time Machine, 2) OSX.5.5 bootable, 3) Windows Vista (on the MacBook) and 4) Windows XP (on the old desktop). If I give 80GB to XP and 70GB to Vista, that leaves 350GB (probably closer to 320-or-soGB in reality) for the MacBook. I don't use virtual machines or any other software to access operating systems - just reboot through BootCamp. What's the best way to go about doing this?

Check out the following Apple Support article to see if it will help: AirPort: How to mount an AirPort Extreme USB hard disk volume in Mac OS X and Windows

Is it possible to use an external hard drive as the windows partition with boot camp?

I am looking to get a Macbook Pro adn was researchin the different software advantages over PC and found a program called oot Camp that allows you to run Windows on your Mac. I thought that this was interesting as it was sort of the best of both worlds. I wanted to know from people who have used this before: How well does it work? Does it slow down the computer at any noticable rate? Etc.
The last question that Ive been trying to find an answer to, but have no conclusive results, is wether you are able to select the partition as an external hard drive or not. Also how it affects your ability to use an external drive as well. Answers are much apreciated, thank you.

Welcome to the Apple Support Communities
Boot Camp is an application that emulates a BIOS so you can install Windows on a second volume on your hard drive. It can't be installed on an external disk because Windows can't be installed on an external hard drive. It works well if you need performance

External hard drive to run windows?

I have recently gotten a macbook pro and, as a student, I will occasionally need to run windows applications such as office etc.. I have considered buying an external USB HD to do this with.
Questions:
1. Will an external hard drive work to run windows and associated apps without putting any microsoft products on my Mac? If so, what size will I need?
2. Is there a better way to accomplish this?
Message was edited by: biggjohn

Will an external hard drive work to run windows and associated apps without putting any microsoft products on my Mac?
Basically, no.
Is there a better way to accomplish this?
Check for Mac versions of those applications. If there aren't any, try CrossOver Mac or WineBottler.
(57567)

HT201250 external hard drive Mac to Windows

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for