Use Firewire Drive with both OSX and XP

Hi,
I am in the process of migrating to a Mac from Windows XP. I have an external hard drive (WD MyBook Pro 250gb) which I have been using to backup data to from Windows. The device is currently formatted to 120gb using NTFS so that Windows can backup to it. The remaining space is currently unformatted.
I need to keep my Windows data for a period while I become comfortable using the Mac before decomissioning the PC. I had assumed that I could maintain the XP NTFS partition, and simply partition the remaining space as an HFS/HFS+ partition using the Disk Tool in the Utilities folder. However, when I attempt this, I don't get any option to format the remaining space - not even as FAT.
Previous experience with Linux led me to believe that this would be easy to accomplish on Mac OSX, but it appears not to be the case.
I have searched Google and other Apple Support forums. At this point I am unsure if it simply a lack of knowledge on my part, or if this just flat out cannot be done with OSX.
Once I am happy that the migration is successful, then I will trash all partitions on the Firewire drive and simply have one HFS/HFS+ partition, but I'd like to have the extra comfort of keeping my data in the interim.
Many thanks for your effort on providing guidance.
Mark

Why not format the remaining space in Windows as FAT32? That way both your XP and your Mac can read and write to the FAT32 space, XP can read and write the NTFS space, and the Mac can read and copy from the NTFS space. The reason I suggest doing the FAT32 format in Windows is because I have had number of cases where Windows (both XP and Vista) simply would not recognize a Mac formatted FAT32 partition, whereas the Mac has never had a problem recognizing and using Windows formatted FAT32 partitions/drives. Once you are quite done with the Windows XP machine and have transferred all the data off the drive, you can then select the whole drive and do a low level reformat. At that time you'll want to change it from the Master Boot Record partitioning scheme it undoubtedly currently has, to the GUID Partition Table that is preferred for Intel machines and Leopard.
Francine
Francine
Schwieder

Similar Messages

Using external hard drive with both iMac and PC

I own an old Dell PC and an iBook, and will soon replace the Dell with an iMac.
I recently bought a 250GB Western Digital external hard drive to back up my data. I would like to use this hard drive to back up all of the files that are on the PC (which I will soon be getting rid of) and also use it for backing up the files on the iBook and, when it arrives, the iMac. In other words, neatly back up all my info onto the back-up drive.
My question is this: can I do this? If not, what is the best way to consolidate all of the data from all of these computers into one place? Will the fact that some data comes from a PC and some from a Mac be a problem? Can you move back-up drives fromone computer to another? The photos on my PC are saved in Picasa, whereas the photos on the iBook are in iTunes. My iPod music files are all on the PC in iTunes.
Any advice about backing all this stuff up in a user friendly way would be greatly appreciated.
By the way, I have heard that there are ways to reformat external drives, to partition them, and to "raid" them. Can someone explain what this all means?
Thanks.
iBook G4

Hello,
Your best option would be to store the files from your PC on the drive with the drive in the FAT32 format. Then, copy the files to your Mac's Internal hard drive.
Now, once the files are stored safely on your Mac's internal hard drive, you can safely reformat the external drive as a Mac OS X Extended (Journaled) drive. That will be the best format to use for long-term purposes with your Mac.
Many OS X file types (such as many PKG files) cannot be stored / written to a FAT32 volume. So, a FAT32 drive would not be suitable for backing-up an entire OS X hard drive (or even many of the system updates that you might download).
So, that's how I'd do it. Use the drive as a FAT32 just long enough to get the files moved to your Mac.
Once the drive is re-formatted in the Native Mac format, then you could copy the files back to it, and any other Mac files that you wanted to back-up to it for safe-keeping.
Personally, I would re-partition it in at least two pieces on the Mac. One to hold data / personal files for safe-keeping, and a second bootable partition for a full system / OS X backup.
You can read a bit more about this in some of my previous discussions here:
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=2536703&#2536703
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=2597825&#2597825
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=2632566&#2632566
Read through each of those three discussions and you'll see how they all come together and provide you with a good solution for backing-up your hard drive.
I hope you don't mind my linking you to those other discussions, but it just seemed more practical than re-typing what I had already said all over again
Also, if you are getting one of the new Intel iMac systems, and you want to be able to create a bootable backup as described in those posts, be sure to format your external hard drive using the new GUID format. That will provide you with the best solution.
I hope this helps.
Let us know if you have other questions.
P.S., if you'd like, go ahead and click the "Helpful" or "Solved" buttons on any of the posts / replies above if you feel they were helpful or adequately answered your question.

Problems using airport express with both macs and a windows xp??

Hi....I have just bought a netbook and my wireless connection that I use at home is via an airport express that works brilliantly on my 2 macs however with the new netbook the connection is intermittent even though it always says its connected to my wireless network.
I am completely hopeless with pc's and just needed a netbook for occasional use but wish I new why sometimes the internet works on it on the airport network and othertimes it doesnt. I have removed all firewalls and still have the same problem.
Anyone know a solution or what may be happening as I am at a loss as to why it intermittenty works even though it always says the connection is excellent.
The macs work just fine!!
thanks in advance
rob

Hi....I have just bought a netbook and my wireless connection that I use at home is via an airport express that works brilliantly on my 2 macs however with the new netbook the connection is intermittent even though it always says its connected to my wireless network.
I am completely hopeless with pc's and just needed a netbook for occasional use but wish I new why sometimes the internet works on it on the airport network and othertimes it doesnt. I have removed all firewalls and still have the same problem.
Anyone know a solution or what may be happening as I am at a loss as to why it intermittenty works even though it always says the connection is excellent.
The macs work just fine!!
thanks in advance
rob

Using Seagate External Hard Drive with both PC and Mac

So I bought this hard drive knowing that it can be used back and forth between Macs and PCs. I currently have a PC, but it's pretty old and I figure I will be getting a Mac after it dies. But currently I want to use it to get files from a Mac computer and when I connect it, it says "read only". How do I configure it to be able to transfer files with a Mac?
Seagate - FreeAgent GoFlex 1.5TB External USB 2.0/3.0 Portable Hard Drive - Black

Here you go:
http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=20090913140023382
If you find my post useful or informative, please click the icon below with the plus sign and star to give kudos. Thank you!

Odd Issue when using Firewire drive with Leopard-Locks up Dock, etc.

I have an odd issue that has developed on my MBP using OS X 10.5.1 Leopard. It only appears to occur when I plug in my External Firewire Lacie Rugged Hard Drive. I only use that Hard Drive approximately once a week when doing a complete mirror backup of my MBP's Hard Drive using SuperDuper. As far as I can tell the issue occurs only once the Hard Drive is plugged in, not because of SuperDuper or the Backup.
Here is the issue: For some reason within a minute of plugging in my hard drive my Dock doesn't work. It scrolls when I put the mouse pointer down to the Dock but it won't open up any icons I click on. It's just like it doesn't recognize the left mouse button. Also, I am unable to select any menus at the top of the screen. I can left click on them and even right click on an icon such as Macintosh HD on the desktop and there is no response. I am able to drag Windows across my desktop though but it seems overall that my keyboard becomes inactive. For example in a open Numbers spreadsheet I am able to use the left mouse button (so it works then) to select a textbox and get the blinking cursor but yet if I type and use even the delete key there is no response. Even after I'm done with the Hard Drive if I drag the Lacie to the trash to eject it won't eject. The only way to eject it is simply pull the Firewire cable out.
I had a few issues with my system earlier and found out I had some bad memory. The memory was replaced and the problems went away. I am worried I had some corrupted files from that time but what puzzles me is I have used my laptop for weeks with no problems. It is only while I plug in this hard drive. In a worse case if I can't figure out how to fix it I feel I'll have to do a complete format and reinstall Leopard and I don't want to have to do that. This only occurs when I do the backup but can be a pain. Any ideas if I can fix this?

Erase and reformat the ext HD. Then, redo the SuperDuper! backup.

Can i use external drive with pc and mac??? files be recognised by both??

hi
i have two external hard drives, with stuff from my pc on them.
can i plug them into my macbook? and just copy files?
usb hard drives.
one i think is one or the other, mac or pc, not both at same time, unless i partition and format i think. maybe the other one too.
i have a 8gb file on my pc, im trying to get into my macbook.
how can i???
i have a 160gb ipod, its only 30gb full, and pc says not enough space on it.
why is this???? the file is only 8gb......and theres over 100gb free on my ipod.
anyone help?
cheers

If your iPod is formatted FAT32 there is a 4 GB file size limit. Obviously an 8 GB file exceeds the limit.
In order to use any drive on both a Mac and a PC with full read/write capability the drive must be formatted MS-DOS (FAT16 or FAT32.) A drive formatted NTFS is read-only on a Mac unless you use third-party software such as MacFuse with NTFS-3G or Paragon NTFS.

External hard drive use with both Mac and Windows

I know that you can't use an iPod (through iTunes) with both Mac and Windows, but can you still use it as an external hard drive with both operating systems?

Yes, if the iPod is in Windows format. Mac OS X can read and write Windows formatted iPods, but Windows can't access Mac formatted disks unless special software is installed.
(9844)

Hard drive formatting for OSX and Windows 7 using GUID

Hey,
I am currently trying to format a 2TB WD Elements external hard drive so that I can use one half with Time Machine and the other half with Windows 7 (run using Boot Camp). From looking around online it appears that GPT is the best to use, and so using Disk Utility I formatted the hard hard drive into 2 partitions, one being Mac Os Extended (Journaled) and left the other as empty space. I then switched to Windows 7 (on the same machine) and formatted the empty space as NTFS. The problem is that now Windows 7 can see both partitions (and can see the contents of the HFS partition which I didn't think would be possible) but OSX can only see the NTFS partition (and has changed the label of the HFS partition from what I set to "disk0s2" when viewed in Disk Utility). I've probably done something very wrong, can anyone help?
Cam

you would have been fine had you set the free space to FAT instead.
You can read only from Windows to HFS unless you buy 3rd party HFS driver.
Same for NTFS only reverse.
You do not need or want to use BC Assistant for that external drive. At. All.

How can I use my external hard drive on both pc and mac, but also being able to use it to back up my mac data?

I want to be able to transfer some of my files from my laptop to my macbook, but not all of them. I have a NTFS external hard drive and I have heard about reformatting it so that it can read/write across both systems, but can I still use this hard drive to back up the data on my macbook? If I can, how should I go about reformatting the hard drive?

FORMAT TYPES
FAT32 (File Allocation Table)
Read/Write FAT32 from both native Windows and native Mac OS X.
Maximum file size: 4GB.
Maximum volume size: 2TB
You can use this format if you share the drive between Mac OS X and Windows computers and have no files larger than 4GB.
NTFS (Windows NT File System)
Read/Write NTFS from native Windows.
Read only NTFS from native Mac OS X
To Read/Write/Format NTFS from Mac OS X, here are some alternatives:
For Mac OS X 10.4 or later (32 or 64-bit), install Paragon (approx $20) (Best Choice for Lion)
Native NTFS support can be enabled in Snow Leopard and Lion, but is not advisable, due to instability.
AirPort Extreme (802.11n) and Time Capsule do not support NTFS
Maximum file size: 16 TB
Maximum volume size: 256TB
You can use this format if you routinely share a drive with multiple Windows systems.
HFS+ ((((MAC FORMAT)))) (Hierarchical File System, a.k.a. Mac OS Extended (Journaled) Don't use case-sensitive)
Read/Write HFS+ from native Mac OS X
Required for Time Machine or Carbon Copy Cloner or SuperDuper! backups of Mac internal hard drive.
To Read HFS+ (but not Write) from Windows, Install HFSExplorer
Maximum file size: 8EiB
Maximum volume size: 8EiB
You can use this format if you only use the drive with Mac OS X, or use it for backups of your Mac OS X internal drive, or if you only share it with one Windows PC (with MacDrive installed on the PC)
EXFAT (FAT64)
Supported in Mac OS X only in 10.6.5 or later.
Not all Windows versions support exFAT.
exFAT (Extended File Allocation Table)
AirPort Extreme (802.11n) and Time Capsule do not support exFAT
Maximum file size: 16 EiB
Maximum volume size: 64 ZiB
You can use this format if it is supported by all computers with which you intend to share the drive. See "disadvantages" for details.

Is snow leopard usb backup drive access much much quicker using firewire than with usb 2.0 ?

is snow leopard usb backup drive access much much quicker using firewire than with usb 2.0 ?

I migrated from a USB2 external hard drive (when it failed) to the Firewire 800 and have not looked back. I also sync from that primary drive to a secondary backup drive (still USB2). Everything I do with the firewire drive is significantly faster than USB2.

Can I mount my external hard drive which will be compatible with both Mac and Windows?

Hello,
Can I mount my external hard drive which will be compatible with both Mac and Windows? If yes, then please let me know, because I intend to use my hard drive for both Windows and Mac, without losing any file.

Yes. By default, Mac OS X and Windows can read and write drives which are formatted as FAT32 or exFAT; NTFS drives aren't writable from Mac OS X without additional software.
(124553)

MacPro with both Leopard and Tiger drives. Want to switch iTunes How

I am running a MacPro with both Leopard and Tiger drives. I finally want to switch everything to Leopard and its drive. I have iTunes on the leopard drive but have never used it. How can I transfer my iTunes music, iPhone Apps etc. from the Tiger iTunes to the Leopard with the least amount of fuss?

Hello hassiman,
For additional information regarding moving the entire library from the 10.4 partition to the 10.5 partition, see this article:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1449
If your iTunes Library is substantial, you may want to consider backing it up to an external location as well:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1751
Hope this helps,
Charles H.

I have an iPhone and iPad. I would like to get my husband an iPhone. Are we able to sync all devices and share info with both iPhones and the iPad, using a single email address?

I have an iPhone and iPad. I would like to get my husband an iPhone. Are we able to sync all devices and share info with both iPhones and the iPad, using a single email address?

Thanks for that. He is one of the last holdouts in IT so an email address for him would just mean I have 2 to check so that is what I am trying to avoid as we move into retirement:)

Using an external hard drive with a Mac and a PC?

I have an external hard drive that I've used with my Windows PC/ itunes / music that I've copied to the PC. Can I use the external hard drive that I use with my Windows PC on my Mac/ itunes / music I've downloaded to my Mac?

wendybird wrote:
I also have a lot of pictures stored on the external hard drive that I can't lose.
(1) Any hard drive may fail at any moment. If you don't have a backup for this external hard drive, your pictures are half-gone already.
(2) If you're trying to make this drive a repository for your music and pics, then its best to format it as FAT32. That's the file system with the widest compatibility, and you'll be able to use the drive with Mac, Win, media players, even TVs with built-in media players. For practicality, it's probably best to keep it attached to a desktop machine and share it on your home LAN for all other devices.

Can I use my iPod with BOTH a Mac and PC???

Might be an odd question and forgive me if it is an obvious answer. I just got a 30 gigger and connnected it up and charged it with my Mac mini at home last night. I have lots of music on my iTunes on my home Mac mini and I have some music on my work Dell Laptop(with iTunes). What would be the best way to sync up my two iTunes libraries (one on my Mac, the other on the Dell lapper) to the iPod, or is it even possible to use it interchangeably with both the Mac and PC??

Yes, you can.
Read through the following article, and make sure your iPod is Windows-formatted using the iPod Updater utility on Windows.
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=61675

Use Firewire Drive with both OSX and XP

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for