External Hard Drive- switching from Mac to PC?

I have an External Hard Drive that I purchased and have been using on my Powerbook G4. If I plug it into a PC, will it lose all my data or screw something up, or is that transition safe? I never formatted the EHD manually like someone suggested, it didn't need to be. It's a LaCie Hard Disk. I suppose it could have formatted itself. Thanks for any and all help!
Neo_kid

Neo_kid,
The drive wouldn't have formatted itself, you would have had to do that manually.
Mount the drive on your Mac and control-click on the drive icon on the desktop. Select "Get Info". What does it say for the Format? If the format is Mac OS Extended or Mac OS Extended (Journaled) then you're going to need 3rd party software on the windows machine to read/write data from/to this disk.
If you plug it into a PC, it'll either be recognized as a disk that the PC can read (in which case you can use it), or it won't (in which case it'll probably ask you to format it). As long as you don't choose to format it, you won't lose any data or screw anything up.

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Using iPod as hard drive, switching from mac to windows

First off, I'm not sure if this belongs in the right section...
Anyway, my dad had to take my imac to his office and bought a windows for regular use at home because we weren't fully happy with an apple computer. Before deleting the files on the imac, i saved them to my 30gb ipod video. Now, when I try to access these files, it tells me that my ipod is formatted for mac and must be formatted for windows. Will this delete the files on my ipod? If so, how can I get my files/music off without anything being deleted?

Restoring an iPod will erase everything on it; prior to restoring the iPod, you can install MacDrive onto the PC and copy the files from the iPod onto the PC.
(18476)

I want to take files from my PC (using a Seagate external hard drive) then plug this Seagate External hard drive into my Mac Book Pro and move the files from the Seagate External Hard drive onto my Time Capsule. I do not want to put these files on my Mac

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Mixing files with data is not always great idea.
See info here.
Q3 http://pondini.org/TM/Time_Capsule.html
Why not just connect the PC directly to the TC by ethernet and copy the files over?
It is hugely faster and much less mucking around.
In windows load the airport utility for windows.. if you have not already as this will help you access the drive.
There is more info here.
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1331

HT3500 how do you transfer data from an external hard drive to a mac time capsule

I am trying to use my Mac Time Capsule as a wireless external hard drive for my MacBook Pro, so how do I transfer the data from a toshiba external hard drive, to my Mac Time Capsule?

Drag and drop or copy and paste files just as you would do with any normal Finder operation.
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How do I input songs from my external hard drive (taken from a PC) and transfer them to my Mac?

How do I input songs from my external hard drive, taken from a PC, to a Mac?

Just a few song tracks, or your whole library? If just a few tracks, drag them from the drive to the open iTunes library window or playlist window. If your whole library drag the whole iTunes folder to your computer. Hold down the option key while starting and guide it to the library.itl file in that folder. If you need to merge libraries post back because that's a much longer post.

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HT2518 i would like to copy files from an external hard drive to my Mac. I intend to do this several times. Does Mac identify this files which have already be copied over or does it re- copy them every time?

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Only copies the file or files you select. The selection will remain unless you change it in case you wish to repeat the same copy to another location. Multiple and different copy operations can be run simultaneously.

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Cannot access shared external hard drive with other mac accounts

I cannot access a shared external hard drive with other mac accounts (all accounts are on the same macbook Pro). The shared external drive is shared via time capsule and is connected (of course) in USB. I see well this external hard drive as a shared disk with my main account. Yes shared option has been activated with the Airport Utility .. but when I open other account these othe accounts can see the external drive but cannot access to its content that is flagged with a no way sign. Strangely enough when I close my main account and start opening a new session with one of the other account then fine I can access the external hard drive and its content .. BUT then it is from my main account than I cannot access its content the no way sign showing ..
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Results of my enquiries at Apple Genius Bar .. the guys found the problem interesting. They've been unable to provide a fix neither to give any explanation as to the reason why. To be fair I was not much impressed by the technical level demonstrated ..
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One Format External Hard Drive for Your Mac and PC...

I have Formatted my External HD Passport 500GB = (465.8) and split it in two partition Mac OS Extended (Journal = 232GB) and FAT32 (Ms-Dos-FAT = 232GB) and reformat to NTFS using Windows...
How to use one External HUD for your Mac and PC you have a PC and how to have two Partition in Mac OS Extended (Journal) and FAT (Ms-Dos-FAT)as you desire the size of your partition under application, Utilities and Disk Utility and covert the (FAT32) to (NTFS)using Windows Control Panel or just search by Start, search Computer Management or just right my Computer and format the second partition to (NTFS)
Tips for Mac OS Extended (Journaled) FAT32 vs NTFS, what works and don't work...
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(2)FAT32 can be use in Mac and Windows but with a limitation that a file cannot be transferred to a FAT32 partition if the file is larger than 4GB such as a video file and FAT32 file system performs more slowly than NTFS...
(2)Mac OS Extended (Journaled) can be use in Windows when you Reformat your HD to HFS+ by third-party app such as http://www.macdrive.com/ MacDrive for $50.or http://www.paragon-software.com/home/ntfs-mac/ NTFS For Mac 6.0 for $30...
Reference link 1 External Hard Drive for Your Mac and PC...
http://www.myfirstmac.com/index.php/mac/articles/1-external-hard-drive-for-your- mac-and-pc
Best regards...
JamesUFOs...
http://www.youtube.com/user/JamesEBEs

I have many external drives I use between my MacBook Pro and my Windows PC's. I use a free NTFS driver for Mac OS-X to give me full read/write access to any NTFS formatted partitions when running Mac OS. I also use MediaFour's MacDrive v8 on some of my Windows PC's to access any HFS+ formatted partitions.
Most of my drives are formatted NTFS because I have more Windows machines than I have MacDrive licenses, and with the driver for Mac OS, they are fully accessible. I have a few drives I do keep formatted as HFS+ because I have encountered an app or two that don't work quite right when they don't get to write to files on an HFS+ partition (one of my backup programs is picky about this).
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Does anyone use a LaCie external hard drive with their Mac using imovie '09? I have some questions.

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Is it possible to format an external hard drive on my mac?

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A HD formatted in EXFAT will transfer data between both PC and Mac.
However dont make the titanic error most do in having merely a single external HD backup of your data, thats a tragedy waiting to happen.
HD are cheap as dirt.
Ideal situation is 3 HD , 1 for Mac backups, 1 for data archives stored away safely and updated as needed / often.
and a 3rd HD in Exfat for data transfers (or a thumb drive for the same thing to save $$)

I am not able to use my external hard drive with my Mac.

I am not able to use my external hard drive with my Mac. It was initially used with my Windows 7 laptop. Now when I insert my Hard drive in the Mac, it doesn't allow me to delete, format, make folders or copy new files on to my hard drive. I no longer have a Windows PC and am stuck. I tried going to Disc utilities,selected my HD, clicked on Erase and then changed the Format type to MS-DOS (FAT) but no luck .. Any other steps or advice?

It was likely formatted in NTFS which is readable by the Mac, but not writeable.
You should be able to reformat the disk in Disk Utility.
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Click on the Partition tab.
Select 1-partition from the partition menu.
Click the Options button and set to GUID
Set the format to Mac OS Extended (Journaled)
Give the Volume a name and click Apply.

External Hard Drive- switching from Mac to PC?

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