Macbook pro for reading and writing NTFS for my external hard drive

Question

Hello,
I have the new Macbook pro with retina display and I tried transfering some of the files on my macbook to my external hard drive (WD My Passport). Of course, it didn't let me. I did some research and found out that Mac only "reads" NTFS systems, but doesn't write. I did some more research to see if there was a way around this. There are several options and I need help with deciding which option is best.
1.  Formatting my external hard drive to the FAT32 file system - however, it says that there are limitations with writing file sizes larger than 4GB. Is that true?
2.  Formatting my external hard drive to the exFAT file system - is this a better option?
3.  Downloading MacFuse - is it really discontinued?
4.  Downloading OSXFUSE - is this better than MacFuse?
5.  Downloading fuse4x - I don't know about this one
Aside from all this individual questions listed, which option is the best?? And, which option will give me less damage or data loss, and which is very reliable?? All I want to do is be able to transfer my documents or files on my MAC to my hard drive, but be able to read/write files on any other PC. I bring my hard drive everywhere and I always need to access my files with any computer I see (like in a computer lab at school/library). 
If you can answer all of my questions, YOU'RE AWESOME!
Thank you!

Answer 1

tin2x58 wrote:
1.  Formatting my external hard drive to the FAT32 file system - however, it says that there are limitations with writing file sizes larger than 4GB. Is that true?
Yes, exFAT is better.
2.  Formatting my external hard drive to the exFAT file system - is this a better option?
Yes, you won't need any third party software, one less hassle.
3.  Downloading MacFuse - is it really discontinued?
4.  Downloading OSXFUSE - is this better than MacFuse?
5.  Downloading fuse4x - I don't know about this one
Don't bother.
Aside from all this individual questions listed, which option is the best?? And, which option will give me less damage or data loss, and which is very reliable?? All I want to do is be able to transfer my documents or files on my MAC to my hard drive, but be able to read/write files on any other PC. I bring my hard drive everywhere and I always need to access my files with any computer I see (like in a computer lab at school/library). 
Take a copy of all the data off the drive. Formatting the drive will erase all existing data.
Take the drive to the oldest Windows OS your going to use it with, if Windows XP there is a free exFAT update from Microsoft, install it first, then right click on the drive and format exFAT, it will create the appropriate partition table (either GUID or MBR) automatically.
Take the drive to the Mac, it will read it just fine whatever it is,.
Drives, partitions, formatting w/Mac's + PC's