MBP see's Ext HD but TimeMachine wont??

Question

Hi All, previously had bought Airport Extreme and was using with Dell laptop until MBPro arrived. I also had setup a Seagate Ext HDrive which my laptop can see and write too etc. Setup my MBP and it too can access Ext HD but when I open Time Machine it does not see it so I cannot select it as backup. I am not experienced with workgroups etc and got the PC to work with it by chance more than knowledge. In Airport though it does show it as a MSHOME workgroup? SHould that be changed bearing in mind the MBP can see it to read write too just not Time Machine.
Thanks
Matt

Answer 1

If the drive is formatted MSDOS then you must re-partition and reformat the drive:
Extended Hard Drive Preparation
1. Boot from your OS X Installer Disk. 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.)
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 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.