Formatting a wg external drive to fat 32?

I cannot format my Western Digital external drive to Fat 32. I want to use it to transfer some files from Microsoft to Mac.

Unfortunately I am familiar with any Windows operating system so I cannot answer your question. I hope that another person reading this will be able to give you a definitive answer.
I agree that a 256 MB USB drive would be a poor choice foe massive data transfer.
Ciao.

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I have my iMovies in QuickTime format on an external drive. Is there anyway to show them from the external drive without putting them into iTunes?

I havei my personal iMovies in QuickTime format on an external drive. I prefer not to have to import them into my iTunes library which is nearly 1GB already. Is there any way to play them from my MacBook Pro through Apple TV 2 without importing them into iTunes?

Just wanted to add a little to the excellent comments from those above... I have debated on adding the content to iTunes or just accessing the content through some folder structure.
What has worked best for me and my family:
use VideoDrive - http://www.aroona.net/VideoDrive/Home.html to import the videos/tvshows into iTunes and make them in the correct format for my iPad/iPhone/AppleTV devices in the house. This software is cheap and excellent and make the adding of content to iTunes (i everything) easy!
I store my videos on a usb 2tb drive and my tvshows on a different usb 2tb drive. And I swap a drive out every year or so and give old drive away to family/friends. That way my media drives are new(ish) and 1 drive is never older than 2 years.
for media that I don't want to add to iTunes I still use AirVideo as it is an excellent piece of software. I also use AirVideo to allow me to access content on my home network over the internet.
my "media server" is a simple 4 year old intel mac mini with 1 gig of ram best $700 I spent when I first flipped to all things mac. Family now have 2 mbp's, 2 iPads, 4 iphones and 1atv (2nd gen)
I'm working on a document that shows how I did my setup - if you want to read more please feel free to download my preview - https://files.me.com/lee.gaupp/aq0gst
Would enjoy feedback

I need to format a new external drive, then need to copy old external to new external

I need to format a new external drive, then need to copy old external to new external

Use the Disk Utility in the /Applications/Utilities/ folder to erase the new drive. If the old external drive doesn't contain a bootable Mac OS X system or a Time Machine backup, you can just drag its contents to the new drive. If it does, use software such as Carbon Copy Cloner or SuperDuper.
(69605)

Format and partition external drive if you want dual use Mac / PC

I had purchased from the Apple store in France a portable hard drive Iomega eGO USB 2.0/FireWire ov 250 Go capacity (P/N 31713900; Model: RPHD-C; S/N: FEAJ02011V)
Originally formatted HFS+, it would mount on any of my Mac desktops with Firewire, easily on the iMac using USB and with great difficulty on the iBook with the two USB plugs (together). It did not mount on any windows PC I had used for tests (so reformatting it FAT(32) or NTFS was *not an option).
I had reformatted it FAT32 using the iMac under mac OS 10.5 for use on multiple computers including Windows PC's. The drive would now accept to:
Mount on the iMac and iBook using Firewire
Mount on the iMac using USB, but it will NOT:
1 - Mount on the iBook using USB, nor
2 - Mount on any Windows PC using USB
The solution was found at the office with our IT helpdesk.
Whether I format it FAT 32 or NTFS (using the Paragon NTFS for mac OS X 10.5) on my iMac under OS 10.5, including when I do the same on another external drive than the Iomega, the PC would not recognise it while it would always mount on a Mac and it was even impossible on the PC to reformat it. The solution is (at least in windows world), you need to (1) format the drive, AND (2) partition the drive, even if this involves creating a single partition. Using Disk Utility of the Mac, I had only formatted the drive and not partitioned it into a single partition and Disk utility did not request that from me. The drive as prepared was perfectly usable on any Mac anyway.
The cure was to go back to the imac which had formatted it, mount it (it mounts), (1) reformat and (2) partition, using a single partition.
Then, the drive would instantly be recognised on the PC as a F drive, whether under FAT 32 or under NTFS.
The blame is in me and on the Apple Drive utility which did not help me (trust it would have been worse in windows world, but this is a bad mark on disk utility)
My suggestion to Apple would be that Disk Utilisty should tell us, once we have formatted a drive (HFS+, FAT 32 or NTFS using Parangon) that we are not done yet and still must create the partition(s), even if we only need one partition.
HTH

Hi Michel-Ange
You are talking to other user like yourself here and not Apple. If you wish to make a suggestion to Apple, I suggest you do it at this site - http://www.apple.com/feedback/macosx.html
Allan

Question about the format of an external drive.....

Ok quick question...
my external is formatted mac OS extended journaled. I need to create a new partition in FAT so that it can be read when I use bootcamp. However when I use disk utility to create a partition it says it would have to format the whole harddrive and I'd lose what is currently on there..
Is there anyway that I can do this without losing what I currently have on there?
I only need to have about 50 gigs read/writeable in windows running on bootcamp.

You might want to try out MacDrive, which will allow Mac OS formatted drives to be read from and written to in Windows. That could save you having to repartition your external drive completely. There's a five-day free trial available so you could try it out first.
Intel Mini 1.66 GHz, Mac Pro 2.66 GHz Mac OS X (10.4.8)
Vista and XP running under Parallels

Trouble formatting a 1TB external drive

I am unable to format or partition a 1TB external drive, connected by fire wire 400. My computer is a Power Mac G5 (not intel), 1.6 Ghz, and 1.25 RAM. I am running OS 10.5.6.
When I first plugged in the TB drive, its icon displayed on the desktop. Under Get Info, it was formatted Windows FAT 32. So I opened Disk Utility and attempted to erase and reformat the drive for Apple. I selected the disk drive icon in the left sidebar window of Disk Utility, clicked on Erase, and selected Mac OS Extended (journaled) and clicked to proceed. After a moment I got an error message that the formatter had failed. The help menu stated that this will happen when trying to format a disk larger than 500 GB. The instructions were to partition the disk, and then, presumably, format the partitions. The disk's icon will no longer show on my desktop, even after a restart. However it still showed in the Disk Utility left side window. So I selected it and clicked the Partition button. But all I get is a window that says this disk cannot be erased. All the partition buttons are grayed out. After trying a few times, the Partition button itself is grayed out and causes the spinning beach ball, and I have to force quit disk utility.
Any suggestions on how I can get this 1TB external disk formatted for Apple?
Thanks in advance for any help.

Uhg... is it too late to return it?
Do no Firewire things show up?
The My Books have had far less than glowing reviews for Macs...
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2191614&tstart=0
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1543028
http://x704.net/bbs/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=3219&p=42023&hilit=western+digital#p420 23
http://x704.net/bbs/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=2939&p=34120&hilit=western+digital#p3412 0

Formatting Problems with External Drive

Hello. I recently switched from a Dell to a Mac, and I love it. The problem is, the motherboard fried on my old Dell. The files on my hard disk are fine, but I can't use migration assistant since the PC won't turn on. My tech support guy put the files from my old Hard drive onto my external hard drive which was formatted for PC use. When I plugged it into my Macbook, Time Machine came up and reformatted the drive, erasing all the files. We gave my stuff back to the Tech support guy, and when he tried to plug the drive into his PC, it was in Mac OS X format, so he couldn't put files on it. Can I possibly change the format of this drive to Fat 32 (whatever that means) on my Mac? Thanks.

Use the Disk Utility in the /Applications/Utilities/ folder to reformat the drive to MS-DOS.
(30283)

How to format a pc external drive with a mac

Hello everyone! It's about a week I've bought a new imac. I used to have a pc. I have an WD external drive which was not compatible with macs, I am trying to format it using the disk utility and choosing Mac OS extended (journaled). When I am trying to erase it, I always get the following message: 'Disk erase failed with the error: couldn't unmount disk. I really need your help people, because I'm new to macs and I have already spend hours googling on that...
Thank you in advance for your response..
My operating system is Mac OSC (10.7.3)

It seems so ironic, but I have just found the answer to my question. I saw a movie which was stored in my WD hard drive yesterday and I hadn't quitted quick time. When I quitted quicktime I was able to erase the disc. I apologise for that people!!

I changed the format to an external drive and lost everything that was on it.

I changed the format on an external hard drive and lost everything that was on it. Is there a way to recover what was on it?

1) Partition your hard drive or add an external drive and install Snow Leopard (with the Optional Rosetta) into it and then you can dual-boot (System Preferences:Startup Disk) into Snow Leopard and run FCE 3.5 there.
2) Use one of the following methods to install FCE 3.5 into Mavericks:
a) Pacifist: http://www.charlessoft.com/
b) Jeremy Johnstone's Terminal method: http://www.jeremyjohnstone.com/blog/2012-03-11-installing-final-cut-pro-studio-2 -0-on-mac-os-x-10-7-lion.html
Reports on this forum seem to confirm that Final Cut Studio 2 will continue to operate in Mavericks once it is functionally installed, albeit some plug-ins may fail to function. FCE 3.5 is the same generation as FCS2, and presumably will continue to operate in Mavericks, as well.

Formatting Seagate 1TB external drive - How long does it take?

I'm 20+ minutes into erasing this disc and see no way to monitor any progress.
I've got a blue-stripe barber pole bar spinning along next to a line that reads: newfs_hfs:/dev/rdisk1s1: partition size is not a multiple of 4K.
Anybody know what that means?
Anybody have an idea how long it takes to wipe 1TB?
TA

Formatting should be instant. It sounds like you aren't just formatting, but also writing zeros or something. If you are using Zero Out Data, I just did that to several new 1TB internal and external drives, and I think it took about 2.5 hours each. Using a Mac Pro and eSATA. It might take longer on a laptop, not sure.
The time seemed appropriate because that was similar to how long it took to clone my machine backups onto them. Each full clone took over 2 hours of copying. Either way, it's writing as fast as it can.
If you used 7-Pass or 35-Pass Erase, frankly you're going to wait days.
Remember, we're talking about one freaking terabyte of data to write. Just a few years ago, it was inconceivable that anyone would need to do that at home. It felt like long enough waiting for my old 250GB disks to zero out, and these are 4x that.

How do you format a WD External drive 3 TB using Mac OS Lion 10.7.2

Hi ,
I bought a WD External drive 3TB , mac sees the external but cannot make use of it. I have tried partioning it , but it will not allow me to.
Any help to format to make it compatible ?
Thanks

Do you select the drive and not the partition when you use disk utility?
What is in blue is the drive, below are the existing partitions. With the drive selected, the partition tab should allow you repartition the drive and select each volumes type, ...

What format for my external drive allows use with Mac and Windows?

I got an external hard disk (1 tr) and i want to used it for my windows and mac, i read i can have two partitions one for mac and one for windows, but i dont really want to have two parts, and I read i can format it by fat32 and i can write and read on both os, is that true?
I want to use it for movies, os backups, and files..
Is it true that i can only save files up to 4 GB when the format is fat32?
please advise..

It this case you would need to to go to "Disk Utility" on mac and select 3 partions which will be under the Parition Layout in my screen shot below. "Current" is grayed out that will drop down select 3 partitions and make one NTFS, second Mac OS Extended, third FAT32. Using the FAT32 for both Mac and Windows but the files have to be under 4GB each.

Formatting an External Drive to work with Leopard AND a PC

Hello,
I have 400 GBs of video footage on an external drive that only works with PCs.
I need to get this material onto my Mac running OSX Leopard.
I am guessing that my best option is to format a second external drive to work both with Leopord and Windows. Then transfer the footage onto the 2nd external drive via a PC.
Any suggestions?
Thanks,
Marc Griffin

What size is this HD? FYI, FAT32 has a 2TB limit on partition size & a 4GB limit on file size.
 Cheers, Tom

How do I move a project from an external drive back into Imovie

I recently bought an Iomega external hard drive to store documentary movies so that I wouldn't jam up my Imac's free space. However, after I moved an imovie/idvd project to it, and wanted to make changes, I could not move the project back into the Imac's drive. (It also would not burn from the external, giving me a multiplex error) When I tried to move the movie back into Imovie on the Imac it said Quicktime couldn't parse it. I saw various posts about parsing, but not about specifically about moving a project from an external drive. Can anyone offer any suggestions? It seems to me that I should be able to move a project back and forth without that much trouble.

Sounds like you have a DVD format (MPEG-2) and not an iMovie Project file.
The key phrases are "multiplex" and "parse". Both suggest MPEG-2 format when opened in QuickTime. It would also throw an error -2048 message if MPEG-2.
But another issue could be the file format of the external drive. Most ship pre-formatted for the Windows OS's but a Mac user should format using HFS+ (and others). If you didn't format the drive before moving the large iMovie Project onto it it may have become severely fragmented if the external used FAT 16 or FAT 32 (very common) formats. They have a 2 or 4 GB file size limit, respectively and would have made your Project unreadable when moved back and forth.
Use the Disk Utility app to find out the format of your external drive.

Transferring large amount of data to external drive

Hi I have 6.53GB of Data on my Mac Pro which is for a Windows XP system! I have attached an NTFS formatted 20GB empty external drive to my system via USB. When I pick up my file to transfer to the external drive a transparent 'no entry' logo appears and I cannot drop it onto the external drive. I'm aware of the 4GB limit using the FAT format but the external disk is definitely NTFS. I have considered using a dual layer DVD but would that work if I'm having these problems now? I would far prefer to just copy this to the external drive as DL DVD's are expensive! Any help would be appreciated. Thanks

The issue is that the Mac OS can't write to NTFS drives without 3rd-party software.
This software can do it, but I'm not sure if it's SL compatible yet:
http://www.paragon-software.com/home/ntfs-mac/
There is also NTFS-3G, which is not SL compatible at this time:
http://www.ntfs-3g.org/
~Lyssa

Formatting a wg external drive to fat 32?

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