How to format FAT drive as MAC OS EXTENDED?

Hello,
Does anybody can help me to format a FAT drive as MAC OS EXTENDED? It is an external FW drive. I cannot find the way in the laptop.
Thanks!!

I've discovered one subtlety with Disk Utility that wasn't at all apparent until I smashed into it headlong. I have a number of machines that have been running Tiger Server since the day it came out, incrementally updating from 10.4 to 10.4.11 as each release came out- so I have a number of 10.4 install disks to support them. I have also been painstakingly backing them up weekly via SuperDooper to emergency firewire backup drives, so that when disasters would occur I could theoretically simply reboot from the external drive and keep going.
At some point, Apple changed both Disk Utility and the requirements for a bootable external disk, and apparently I didn't get the memo. The old Disk Utility present on the original 10.4 disks lacks the "Options" feature found on the current one under the Partion tab- which allows the user to select the partition table format. There are now three options: Master Boot Record (FAT/DOS), GUID Partition Table (used to support the Intel OS X machines), and Apple Partition Map for the PPC machines.
Regrettably, PowerPC machines running 10.4.11 apparently *will not boot* from disks reformatted from DOS/FAT as Mac OS X Extended with the old disk utility, as I found to my woe when I installed Security Update 2008-008 and all my Server machines stopped working. They appear on the list of bootable drives when booting in select mode, they appear in the list for selecting the boot disk in System Utility, they can be selected- but the machine will simply not boot from them. The old utility apparently used to leave the FAT/DOS Master Boot Record partition table in place when reformatting to Mac OS Extended. I discovered that it was necessary to use the new utility, and specifically go into the options and select "Apple Partition Table", if you intend to be able to boot from an external drive reformatted from FAT/DOS with 10.4.11-era machines. And it should be noted that the new disk utility *does not* do this table selection by default: you have to use the Options button under the Partition tab and set it appropriately yourself.
Consequently, I spent several days reformatting, repartitioning, changing partion table types, and recloning my backup drives so as to render them bootable once again under this apparently new scheme. So, as a word to the wary: if you have been maintaining bootable external drives since the early (perhaps pre-10.4.7) releases of Tiger, it would behoove you to take a few minutes to go make sure that they are actually *still bootable*- and correct this gotcha before you run into it in an hour of need.
The other bad news if that, if you have the original 10.4 Server disks, "Archive and Install" does not appear to be an option, and you only have a disk utility that can't produce a bootable external disk in any case when booting from them. So it can be a painful exposure.

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How to format external drive to MAC OS Extended w/ MBR scheme?

Hello all,
I have a Maxtor 1TB drive that I would like to format to MAC OS Extended (Journaled) but also using a Master Boot Record partition map scheme.
Every time I try using the Disk Utility, I get a partition error. It will only let me partition using a GUID scheme, however the XBox360 that I also connect my drive to requires a MBR scheme.
I have another another Maxtor drive formatted in this manor, so I can't quite understand why I keep receiving this error!
Any help would be much appreciated. Thanks
Message was edited by: Gio_vanni

Not doable. AFAIK, your choices are APM, GPT, and MBR. Additionally, HFS+ isn't available for windoze's MBR; only MS-DOS or FAT-32.

How to format Windows drive with Mac OS format

Hello
I have a Windows 160gb internal drive that is formated in Fat32. I am unable to format this drive with Mac OS X 10.3.9 in order to install Tiger 10.4. When I attempt to format using the Mac OS extended (journaled), I receive an error (sorry I didn't write it down) partition error. If I use the Mac OS extended option I recieve an error that the drive can not be unmounted.
How can I format this 160gb drive with Mac OS format so that I may install Mac OS X 10.4
Thank you

Do the following:
Extended Hard Drive Preparation
1. Open Disk Utility in your Utilities folder. If you need to reformat your startup volume, then you must boot from your OS X Installer Disc. After the installer loads select your language and click on the Continue button. When the menu bar appears select Disk Utility from the Installer menu (Utilities menu for Tiger or Leopard.)
2. After DU loads select your hard drive (this is the entry with the mfgr.'s ID and size) from the left side list. Note the SMART status of the drive in DU's status area. If it does not say "Verified" then the drive is failing or has failed and will need replacing. SMART info will not be reported on external drives. Otherwise, click on the Partition tab in the DU main window.
3. Click on the Options button, set the partition scheme to GUID (only required for Intel Macs) then click on the OK button. Set the number of partitions from the dropdown menu (use 1 partition unless you wish to make more.) Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Partition button and wait until the volume(s) mount on the Desktop.
4. Select the volume you just created (this is the sub-entry under the drive entry) from the left side list. Click on the Erase tab in the DU main window.
5. Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Options button, check the button for Zero Data and click on OK to return to the Erase window.
6. Click on the Erase button. The format process will take 30 minutes to an hour or more depending upon the drive size.
Steps 4-6 are optional but should be used on a drive that has never been formatted before, if the format type is not Mac OS Extended, if the partition scheme has been changed, or if a different operating system (not OS X) has been installed on the drive.

Unable to format external drive as Mac OS Extended

I just bought a WD 3TB My Book Essential external hard drive so I can free-up space on my Mac Mini. When I used Disk Utility to erase the data and reformat the drive as Mac OS Extended, I got the following error:
+Disk Insertion+
+The disk you inserted was not readable by this computer+
There were three options; Initialize, Ignore or Eject. Choosing either Initialize or Ignore resulted in the following error:
+Disk Utility Internal Error+
+Disk Utility has lost its connection with the Disk Management Tool and cannot continue. Please quit and relaunch Disk Utility+
So I Googled it and found the following thread http://discussions.info.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=11461203
This suggested using First Aid; Repair Disk. When I ran this, I got the following error:
+First Aid failed+
+Disk Utility stopped repairing “disk4s1” because the following error was encountered:+
+Filesystem verify or repair failed+
I'm stuck; does anyone have any ideas how to resolve this?!

Not sure what the problem was on the MacMini (10.5.8), but I just managed to format the disk on my MacBook Pro (10.6.4).
Problem solved!

Formatted External drive for Mac OS extended

Hi,
I actually change from windows to Mac (no comparison...!!) but trying to transfer my photos (Pictures in finder) to an external hard disk i can`t drag and drop and i do not know why....i read in one forume that i have to formatted the external drive for Mac OS extended. First question: how could i do that? if my hard disk was originally formatted for windows, do i lose the info when i formatted?
Thanks!!

You will lose the files on the HD when you reformat it. So copy what you want off the drive to a folder on your Mac temporarily.
select the HD on the Desktop and launch Disk Utility.
select the HD in the left hand page of DU.
click on the Partiton button
select 1 Partition
select OS X Extended (journaled) in the drop down Format menu.
click on the Apply button
drag the folder of files onto the EHD to copy back and then delete from your Mac's drive after verifying that they all copied back successfully.
OT

How to format external drive for mac AND pc use

hi
i want to format my external drive so i can use it on my mac and on pc's as well. i've gathered that the MS-DOS format is the way to go. my question is this: would this create any problems for my mac then?
can i partion one part for ms-dos and part for macos extended?
cheers
-j-

There are a couple of disadvantages with formatting a
disk as FAT32. Firstly, there is a limit on the file
size for FAT32. I think it like 2 GB so if you
capturing video the results will probably not fit
into this file limit. Secondly FAT32 will not be
bootable. I alway clone my system to a backup disk as
bootable. That way if anything goes wrong with my
system, I can just boot from my backup disk and fix
it.
The problem with doing this though is that the drive will not be usable with Windows (which was in the original posting) unless you use the third party MacDrive software on the PC.
iFelix

How to format hard drive with mac air for use on mac and pc

I'm new to MAC and can't make much sence of what has been said to do in other questions. All I want to be able to do is use my 500gb My Passport hard drive on my MAC and other PC's. I have saved all the data that I want to keep on another hard drive so can re-format the hard drive if needed. I want to do all the set up on my MAC AIR.
Please help,
Cheers Hutch

Reading assignment:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ExFAT
Ciao.

Format TC Drive to Mac OS Extended?

been on the phone with mac support for about an hour about this but they could not help me even though they say it is possible. to cater for pc users the default format is fat 32 (according to support) which has a number of limitations like max file size and file name length.
anyone has a clue on how to do it? my TC disk will not show up in disk utility which was normal according to support ... but they also said that there is a 3rd party disk utility that can do it but they could not tell me the name of it as it breaks warranty.
thanks

Well your right. Though I'm not convinced that what is showing up in Disk Utility is the actual physical Time Capsule disk. This is actually very interesting.
What shows up when I do what you describe is not the actual physical Time Capsule disk per se but the Time Machine sparse bundle backup.... i.e. a disk image. And yes it does have a partition option and it appears like the disk in the sense of a map and free space that is more or less the actual free space on the physical Time Capsule disk. But it gives as the description of the disk (at the bottom) as "Apple sparse bundle disk image." This is not how other physical disks/super drive as well as direct USB attached disk are described in Disk Utility.
What appears on the left side panel of the disk Utility window is not the name of my Time Capsule physicl disk but the name of the sparse bundle file for my machine on the physical Time Capsule disk.
Similarly I can double click on the Time capsule and then the Time Capsule disk and then the sparse bundle image for another Mac that is being backed up on the Time Capsule and it to appears also as a disk image in the Disk Utility described not as a disk but as a sparse bundle disk image.
I'm not sure what happens - I'm not going to try ;<) - if you partition it but I suspect you partition the disk image - not the physical disk. I'm not sure.
Further, I have a USB disk attached to the Time Capsule. When I look at it's contents in Finder, I see absolutely nothing in Disk Utility yet I can view/manipulate all the files on the disk - Disk Utility doesn't seem to think of it as a disk.
Similarly if I mount another disk image file - a .dmg file - it also appears in Disk Utility and is described just like the TC sparse bundle image.
Do you see something different? such as the actual name of the physical Time Capsule disk showing up int Disk Utility.....I can;t figure out how to do it.

How to format HDD for mixed Mac/Windows on shared USB drive

I've been doing a lot of reading so that I can get my new Seagate 500MB USB external drive connected via my AEBS. I'll be sharing the USB with a G3 PowerMac, an iBook, two XP and one Vista Laptop. I've been able to print from all machines to my Canon i960 and set up seemed easy. I'm confused as to how I should format the HD, should if be HFS+ so both windows and Mac can use? I've read some say MS-DOS partition will be best especially if you want to have bigger than 32GB partition and for files greater than 300MB. I'll be putting pictures, iTunes and likely some ripped DiVX videos as well as some DVR's to share across the network. I'll be using a Belkin powered USB Hub to connect the HD and the printer to the AEBS.
Thanks,
Jim

If you are connecting the drive to the USB port on theAirPort Extreme base station (AEBS), for best performance format the drive HFS+ (Mac OS Extended). Both Windows and Mac clients will be able to access and use the drive.
The only other formats recognized by the AEBS are FAT32 and FAT16.

Is it safe to format ANY external drive to Mac OS Extended?

Some Seagate tech told me a while back that Seagate drives should ONLY be formatted with their proprietary formatting and that my data is vulnerable if I use something else. (I may have misunderstood this, but I'm 98% certain that's what he said.) I do remember him saying not to use the Mac's Disk Utility to format the drive.
I want to reformat this drive so that it's 100% compatible with my new Mavericks iMac.
Is there any concern about formatting ANY external drive to Mac OS Extended (Journaled). Or are there some hard drives that should not be formatted to Mac using Disk Utility?
I'm under the impression that all external drives are basically the same and I can format them however I want. No drive is "made" to be formatted with a certain OS or a certain format.
Is that correct?

Formatting a drive simply will remove any data currently stored on it. There is no such thing as "proprietary formatting." Drives come out of the factory with no formatting.
Whatever the person told you it was patently wrong not to mention mis-informed.
To use a hard drive properly with any computer it needs to be formatted with the tool that is required for the operating system with which it will be used. For the Mac you use Disk Utility (the tool) and you format the drive using Mac OS Extended, Journaled (the format.)
Your impression is correct.

Can't format external drive for Mac

I got an external Seagate Freeagent 750GB drive to use with my new Mini. It came formatted as a windows FAT volume. Since I don't have a FW400 to FW 800 cable yet, I have it connected via USB. When I try to reformat as a Mac drive (with any of the 4 case-sensitive / journaled options), I get an error, but I can then reformat as FAT. Does anyone know how I can format this drive as mac and what the problem is?

It may have something to do with the partition scheme. There are at least three different schemes. One is used for windows formats (so you can use FAT32 or NTFS format), one is used for Intel Mac (probably GUID, not sure), and one is used for PowerPC Mac (probably the Apple Partition Map, again not sure). I don't know whether it is smart enough to choose the appropriate scheme for you when you have selected a format for your partition. Try to select the right scheme for Intel Mac first, and then decide on the format on each (if you have more than one partition on that disk) partitions.
I think you have to make sure the format is compatible with the scheme, especially when you have multiple partitions on one disk. You can't format one partition to FAT32 and another to HFS+, although it will try to do something, but it will end up with error.

Can somebody please explain how to format and then reinstall Mac lion10.7 without cd

can somebody please explain how to format and then reinstall Mac lion10.7 without cd

You will need either an Ethernet or Wifi Connection to the Internet - USB Mobile device is not supported.
If you already have Lion installed you can boot to Recovery with Command R and use the Disk Utility to erase the Macintosh HD and then reinstall the OS from the Mac OS X Utilities.
You will need the Apple Id used for purchase if the Mac did not ship with Lion installed originally.
If you want to repartition the HDD you can use the Recovery Disk Assistant to make a recovery USB drive
http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1433
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4848
As Always - Back up the Mac before erasing unless you are confident there is absolutely nothing on the mac that you might possibly need later.
If the machine is a 2011 build or later you might be able to boot to Internet Recovery with Command Option R

Greeting, I want to reformat my external hard drive using Mac OS Extended (Journaled, Encrypted ) but before formatting it, I want to make sure that if I loose the hard drive or the hard drive get stolen, no one will be able to retrieve or recover the in

Greeting,
I want to reformat my external hard drive using Mac OS Extended (Journaled, Encrypted ) but before formatting it, I want to make sure that if I loose the hard drive or the hard drive get stolen, no one will be able to retrieve or recover the information on it so could you tell me what kind of encryption will be used or is there any way to recover the information?
Thanks!

I think FileVault is used to encryp internal hard drive but I wanna encrypt an external hard drive with Mac OS Extended Journaled Encrypted which is completely different!

Moving iPhoto to external drive; have formatted external disk to Mac OS Extended (Journaled), moved the iPhoto library to external drive; when trying to change the library, the iPhoto file on new external is greyed out can't be selected.What went wrong?

Must have done something wrong..
1. formatted external disk to Mac OS Extended (Journaled) - required a partition, but that went fine. Entire new external disk was included in the partition formatted to Mac OS Extneded (journaled).
2. moved iPhoto library to new external disk
3. Holding Option key down, opened iPhoto
4. Choose library feature appeared, however when new library function option appeared and "choose library" selected, the iPhoto folder appearing in the new external drive was greyed out and not able to be selected. Therefore the default library remains the original iphoto library on the Mac.
I've moved the original iphoto library to the trash and then tried to start iPhoto. A message comes up that the iPhoto is in the trash and needs to be pulled out before iPhoto can start (clearly the new iphoto library on the external drive is not being seen.
Can anyone suggest where I went awry? Thanks!

Try trash the com.apple.iPhoto.plist file from the HD/Users/ Your Name / library / preferences folder.
(On 10.7 or later: Hold the option (or alt) key while clicking on the Go menu in Finder to access the User Library)
(Remember you'll need to reset your User options afterwards. These include minor settings like the window colour and so on. Note: If you've moved your library you'll need to point iPhoto at it again.)
What's the plist file?
For new users: Every application on your Mac has an accompanying plist file. It records certain User choices. For instance, in your favourite Word Processor it remembers your choice of Default Font, on your Web Browser is remembers things like your choice of Home Page. It even recalls what windows you had open last if your app allows you to pick up from where you left off last. The iPhoto plist file remembers things like the location of the Library, your choice of background colour, whether you are running a Referenced or Managed Library, what preferences you have for autosplitting events and so on. Trashing the plist file forces the app to generate a new one on the next launch, and this restores things to the Factory Defaults. Hence, if you've changed any of these things you'll need to reset them. If you haven't, then no bother. Trashing the plist file is Mac troubleshooting 101.
Then try select it again.

How to install hard drive into mac pro

how to install hard drive into mac pro

I recently bought a new 2TB internal sata drive for my Macpro.
The installation was easy, but I'm not sure what to do next.
For one, should I partition the drive?
My purpose for buying the drive was to use it as my go to drive for Parallels. I used to run my music studio on Windows based machines, and my older project files require a windows OS to recover. I installed Parallels so I can have my studio running Mac and Windows programs which will enable me to access my old project files and take them into my newer Protools system.
So now, I've installed my new hard drive, but I'm not sure if I should partition it....And!? I'm not sure how to designate that drive for my virtual pc on Parallels. I was able to allocate enough disk space to parallels in order to load my music software, but at this point, I'm not sure if I've just promised it disk space from my original partitioned drive (which only has about 350 GB left on it).
I would love to be able to make one internal drive available for Parallels, and the other available for the rest of my OSX. When I use Parallels, I still would like to save some extra information on the 2TB drive as well from my dekstop running OSX.
I hope this makes sense! Your help is much appreciated!

How to format FAT drive as MAC OS EXTENDED?

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