Which MAC OS EXTENDED format? journaled, case-sensitive?

I'm going to be using my new Mac Pro for editing corporate videos and I want to use an external firewire800 LaCie 1tb drive from my windows computer on my Mac.
I've gone to the disc utility screen and not sure which format I should re-format it as. I've been told to use MAC OS EXTENDED but there is several flavours: journaled, case-sensitive, etc.
I need it to be as fast as possible but also reliable and able to handle large video files (e.g. 60gb HD files.

The Mac can read and write FAT32 and FAT16 volumes, and it can read NTFS volumes (cannot write to NTFS). FAT32 will only allow files up to 4 GB in size, so it's really not acceptable for video. The Mac generally reads it's own format, Mac OS Extended faster and more reliably.
If you need platform independence, you have a few options.
1 - Get Windows machines to read Mac OS Extended with special software.
2 - Get the Mac to write to NTFS with special software
Because of the way the Mac manages external hard drives, option #1 is ideal. But you should keep in mind, the Mac will run your FireWire 800 drive faster than the Windows machine not because of compatibility, but due to the fact that Windows doesn't support FireWire 800 and limits transmission with those devices to FireWire 400 speeds (or so I've been told).
The Mac Pro will partition using the GUID Partition Table scheme by default. This partition scheme is required to boot an Intel Mac, but not for simple reading and writing of data. I'm not sure what implications this might have on the ability of your Windows system to read the data, but it's worth checking. It's possible that the Windows software might not recognize GUID, but I'm not sure.
I think most people who edit video professionally on the Mac are choosing to alleviate this confusion by avoiding Windows altogether. That works very well.
Use Mac OS Extended (Journaled).
Case-sensitive can sometimes cause problems and is best avoided.
Interesting to note, Adobe software won't run on a case-sensitive volume.

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I am typically burn my files and folders on the Desktop. The reason I do this is that I hope the files will be readable on both a Mac and a PC. They seem to be do that just fine. But it was not until today that I noticed that these DVD's end up being formatted as "Mac OS Extended" even though Windows XP with Service Pack 3 can read them just fine. But I also have an older DVD that was burned the same way and also says it is formatted in the "Mac OS Extended" format. But that DVD is not readable on my PC even though it is readable on my Macbook. I am trying to understand if something changed in the Mac operating system that changed with this format. I am also trying to understand the Mac OS Extended format and primarily what is the BEST way to burn a DVD that works on a PC and a Mac.
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On the Mac, it says the format of the DVD is Mac OS Extended but when you run it on WIndows XP with SP3, it says the DVD is formatted as UDF (Universal Disc Format) which I think is interesting because I burned several DVD's on my PC in the UDF format version 2.5, which is the latest, but the Mac OS could not read them. So it must be an older version of UDF Apple is using or some type of custom format that Apple uses.

HT1604 Is there any difference between Mac OS Extended Format and ExFat?

Is there any difference between Mac OS Extended Format and ExFat? I read in a blog that the ExFat was a good way to format an external drive because it avoided many of the pitfalls of the other formats, as long as it is supported by the operating system. I tried to format my new Seagate drive, and got an invalid option error. I was able to format it in Mac OS Extended format. Can you please tell me if this is similar to ExFat. Thanks.

The Mac OS format can only be natively read to and written to by a computer running the Mac OS. This creates a problem if the user wishes his external, or other drive to have seamless compatibility between two different OS's, such as Windows and Mac. Yes, there are software solutions that enable a Windows PC to work with a drive formatted as Mac OS, but it gets complicated if you wish that drive to have compatibility "on the fly" with any PC you may encounter.
It turns out that the format known as ExFAT is able to be natively read by both a Mac and a PC, without running any additional drivers on either machine. ExFAT also doesn't have some of the limitations of FAT32, which both OS's will also read/write.
ExFAt is not perfect though. Formatting the drive as Mac OS Extended has some advantages on a Mac. First, it is the only format that permits all functionality of the Mac OS, such as using the drive for Time Machine.
ExFAt is often thought of as the best middleground for an external partition/drive that needs to have easy cross platform compatibility between a Mac and PC running Vista or Windows 7.

Disk Utilty - Reformating Windows-formated drive to MAC OS Extended Format

Can a drive previously formatted as Windows FAT32 or NFTS subsequently be reformatted to the MAC OS Extended format, via OS X Panther Disk Utility's Erase and/or Partition options?
If so, is it straightforward to do, or are there any potential pitfalls?

Hello! Yes, it should work fine to use disk utility to format the drive to HFS+. Tom

Mac OS Extended (Journaled) Case sensitive

Hi.
What is the difference between *Mac OS Extended (Journaled)* and the same format +*'case sensitive'*+ please?
Is there a recommended link I may follow to find the answer?
Thank you in anticipation.

In other words, if I reformatted, say, my external HDD as 'case sensitive' what difference in functionality would I notice (if anything)?
Having it on provides the ability to store items in the same folder with names that differ only in letter capitalization. Some applications may not work correctly with a disk in that format.
(40369)

Error code 0 when copying a large file to a Mac OS Extended formatted drive

I always back up my photos manually by dragging a folder containing many folders containing many photos into an external drive that I immediately formatted as Mac OS Extended (Journaled) the day I bought it 2 years ago. I now run into a Error Code 0 when I do this. The "mother" folder is 240 GB in size. As I stated, this drive has been formatted for the Mac, so I don't understand why it's (apparently) running into a problem peculiar to FAT32-formatted drives. My iMac has 16 GB of RAM, of which 10 GB was free, the last time I tried to do this.

Well, you did mention...
so I don't understand why it's (apparently) running into a problem peculiar to FAT32-formatted drives
I kind of had to assume at that point the source drive was the one you formatted as Mac OS Extended two years ago, and the target drive was FAT32. If not, then I'm not sure why you mentioned FAT32 at all.
In that same thinking, error code 0 is directly related to FAT formatted drives.

Capture Problem (av-1) - Mac OS Extended formatted drives

I've got a bit of a stumper. I've been trying to capture some video. (I'm backing up all my Hi8 tapes to DVD.) I have no size limit enabled. The time limit is set to 30 minutes. When I finish, FCP stop the capture and creates the capture files. I have one 4.1GB file (Untitled) with the movie and sound and another 780MB file (Untitled-av-1) which is not playable. The movie file plays with quick time and is able to be edited with FCP. But, the other file does nothing. If I delete the second file, the first movie becomes unplayable and uneditable in FCP.
I searched this issue. I do not have Norton AV or any virus protection software. All my drives are formatted MacOS extended.
I don't know why else this extra file is there? Anybody know? I've captured files before and this did not happen. Strangely it's happening now.

Well, you did mention...
so I don't understand why it's (apparently) running into a problem peculiar to FAT32-formatted drives
I kind of had to assume at that point the source drive was the one you formatted as Mac OS Extended two years ago, and the target drive was FAT32. If not, then I'm not sure why you mentioned FAT32 at all.
In that same thinking, error code 0 is directly related to FAT formatted drives.

Question: Do Any Mac/Lightroom users use a case-sensitive filesystem?

I know most people use the default case-insensitive Mac filesystem. But plugins may have issues in a case-sensitive filesystem (if not explicitly programmed to handle case), which I just learned is an option for Mac users. Just wondering if any Lightroom users actually do it.
Thanks,
Rob

areohbee wrote:
I'm starting to think that having a case-sensitive filesystem on Mac would only be done by people with very special purposes in mind - e.g. developers who want to test unix command-line apps..., and would "always" be accompanied by case-insensitive volumes for normal Mac use - e.g. Lightroom-data/plugins/photos...
Ya think?
Almost certainly.
As I mentioned before, case-sensitivity is required for, among other things, POSIX compliance, which is of particular interest to a segment of the enterprise and interoperability spaces. Microsoft achieves this by a kernel change (and one of two POSIX-for-Windows licensed libraries) and offering a case-sensitive file system, NTFS. Apple achieves this by offering a way to make HFS+ case-sensitive, with kernel services and a BSD POSIX subsystem that is case-sensitive to the extent the file system is.
Note that apps that treat filespecs as unique when they differ only in case are not necessarily "poorly coded" as this would depend on context and application. There are some very, very good reasons to do so. In fact, one could make an argument that apps that cannot handle a case-sensitive environment are the poorly coded examples. Blindly assuming the case of a filespec makes it unique, or rewriting an existing filespec to a "corrected" one, are very dangerous assumptions.
For most of us, the defaults are more natural, and I would hazard a guess that Lr gets little or no QA under such environments. I know of at least one corner-case (exposed here) that would probably break.

Error -1309 large file transfers under Mac OS extended format

When transferring large video files from one firewire drive to another in OSX panther on Rocstor firewire media formatted in Mac OS extended, I am getting error -1309 and lots of problems. The new 250 gig even became unreadable, data was lost, and I had to reformat. It hung norton disk doctor and sometimes the OS reported that copy times for 7 gig files would be 936 hours.
This is a brand new rocstor drive, and frankly I do not think the drive is the source of the problem, (but who knows?) perhaps the files have become corrupted.
For example, if I try to drag a 4.8 gig file from a 75 gig firewire to a 250 gig newly formatted firewire drive, (with 230 gigs open space), it starts copying, then a minute later it stops and tells me the disk is full!
Neither diskwarrior nor norton disk doctor have found a problem with the firewire media or the files. (well, there was one, "a major error was found in the ALternate Volume HEader Block, last mounted version is invalid", but Diskdoctor corrected this) I have researched error -1309 on the internet, but there is surprisingly only a sparse amount of info about it.
On the first copy operation a few weeks ago there was not really a problem (about 61 gigs worth of quicktimes). The files copied fine. Now these same files -- some of them, especially the large ones, up to 7.5 gigs, are refusing to copy from the (second or third) generation firewire drive to yet another firewire drive.
Any insights on this puzzling problem would be appreciated.
thanks
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Status update:
With a brand new Rocstor firewire 250 gig drive I am unable to record video without getting a FILE I/O error within 2-4 minutes, or dropped frames. I had just reformatted the firewire Mac OS Extended. This drive is just a couple of days old. I have other Rocstor firewire drives that do not seem to have this problem. I have been using a couple of rocstors for more than 2-3 years. Furthermore, the other rocstor drives also contained the same types of files, in an earlier generation.
The only I way I could have "contaminated" the newer drives was to attempt to copy quicktime files over 4 gigs to the funky drive. This has happened twice now, once with a 300 gig rocstor "400" less than a year old, and now with a 250 gig rocstor "400" just a couple days old. (Incidentally, I have put in two tech calls to them about this matter this week. Their recommendation was to reformat mac os extended.)
Well, this is puzzling.
-John

I recent la format the drive and create a case sensitive jornal and put a password. How I undo it if I just see the whole drive as the recovery disk

I want to format my computer and I start to do that but I fondo a copy of the boot folder on the drive, not the recovery drive. I formated and make it case sensitive jornal with a password. Then I put a password in main too. So the drive the entre drive become my recovery drive.So I have two recovery drive I think.I learn almost all the diskutil comando and I don know how to fin it. The disks are not showing the one with the passwords.

Hi Kappy,
Just wondering if you had any advice for my situation . . .
My time machine backup was backing up to a drive that was "Mac OS X Enteded Journaled, Case Sensitive." I had no idea what this meant, or that it would even cause issues.
I took my computer to the Apple store yesterday, and they wiped it clean. When they tried to restore it from the Time Machine backup drive, it would not work. Their guess is that Time Machine cannot restore from a drive that is "case sensitive."
Any thoughts on how I can convert my time machine backup data from a "case sensitive" state, to a "non-case sensitive" state? I've tried to just drag and drop the files from the case sensitive formatted drive to a new drive that I have that is formatted non case sensitive, but I get the following error message:
"The volume has the wrong case sensitivity for a backup"
I just really want my data back - I thought TimeMachine was the way to go (and was supposed to work) but unfortunately it is not.
Any help you can provide would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,

How do i reformat a case sensitive external hard drive without losing data

I know there are a lot of posts about this, and i have spent hours trying to find a soloution / understand what people have responded to others, but i can't work this out.
I also have a Buffalo HD (let's call it HD1) that stores my itunes library.
I have a WD My Passport for Mac (let's call it HD2) that backs up my Mac Book Pro.
I have an older WD that has older TM back ups on it from previous computers (let's call it HD3)
I have one spare completely 'clean' WD hard drive (let's call it HD4).
My laptop was really slow and full so i went to Genius bar, they sold me the Buffalo HD and they moved my itunes to it and set it up so it now has my itunes. I used this disk to run two TM Backups before i realised the drive was nearly full, so i bought the WD My Passport HD2.
I now use WD My Passprt HD2 for TM.
I want to MOVE the backups on HD1 to My Passport HD2 as there is lots of space on it. I also want to move my itunes library from HD2 as a back up.
But i can't!!!
After reading for hours, apparently this is because my HD1 is case sensitive, journaled. And it needs to be Journaled to work with TM/OSX or something very confusing. I have read lots of threads about re-formatting / partitioning and all things that are way over my head. But the one thing i do understand is if i reformat HD1, it erases the data.
This is NOT an option as it holds my WHOLE itunes. The Itunes is WAY too big to drag onto my mac book pro and then move it over to HD2 and make that my itunes folder.
HOW THE **** ARE YOU SUPPOSED TO BACK UP THE CASE SENSITIVE DRIVE BEFORE REFORMATTING IT IF IT'S TOO BIG TO FIT BACK ON YOUR COMPUTER? Surely that's the whole point of having an external drive... to back up AND give you more space?
I'm so mad that the apple store did this to me... they should know that case sensitve wouldn't work with a passport... that i would have problems. UGh.
I have options to move the files from HD1 as i have HD2 and HD3 and then also the completely unused HD4... but i can't move anything anywhere due to this case sensitive nightmare.
Someone PLEASE HELP ME.
thanks.

Hi Kappy,
Just wondering if you had any advice for my situation . . .
My time machine backup was backing up to a drive that was "Mac OS X Enteded Journaled, Case Sensitive." I had no idea what this meant, or that it would even cause issues.
I took my computer to the Apple store yesterday, and they wiped it clean. When they tried to restore it from the Time Machine backup drive, it would not work. Their guess is that Time Machine cannot restore from a drive that is "case sensitive."
Any thoughts on how I can convert my time machine backup data from a "case sensitive" state, to a "non-case sensitive" state? I've tried to just drag and drop the files from the case sensitive formatted drive to a new drive that I have that is formatted non case sensitive, but I get the following error message:
"The volume has the wrong case sensitivity for a backup"
I just really want my data back - I thought TimeMachine was the way to go (and was supposed to work) but unfortunately it is not.
Any help you can provide would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,

Change from case-sensitive disk format to the normal Mac OS Extended.

Hi,
I need to change from a case-sensitive disk format to the normal Mac OS Extended Journaled version.
I have no external HD fitted, but I do have some DVD-Rs. I need to restore the data from 2 users, including iTunes and iPhoto files.
What's the best way to achieve this?
Many thanks,
Tris.

I just got off of the phone with Adobe support. They told me they knew the solution, but that they would not tell me tonight. I had to call back between 6:00 am and 5:00 PM tomorrow. That does not work with my schedule. So I googled some stuff and found that Adobe CS 3 is not supported with Case-Sensitive file systems. So OK, let me install this to my other MAC that has a non case sensitive drive. Same error. Even though I have a non case-sensitive drive, the OS is on a Case-Sensitive Drive and I am never prompted where to install like most all other Mac Software.
I have always formatted case-sensitive. So I am thinking to myself why not start using a non case-sensitive drive. Well, to start off I want it case sensitive. I enjoy web programming and like this feature. Sure it is not needed, but I am glad Apple offered me a choice. And I am sure there are many other reasons why to use it. Also I would be interested in knowing why non case-sensitive drives are supperior.
Why is this a requirement now? I have used Adobe software in the past without this specific issue. I also have Large TB drives and do not know how to 'safely' do this. You will not catch me jumping through this hoop. I will not risk the change to the file system. And I can not be expected to format my drive. I just wonder what Adobe would say tomorrow if I called.
The Direct line I was given by adobe is 800-642-3623 for support on this issue. You don't need anything else but to call this number and ask. You can not get through after hours though.
Wow, I just can't believe this and the lack of interest Adobe had with me.
I hope I can get a refund on the software. Until I am able to downgrade my file system format, I do not want to sit on Adobe's bill. I will buy it again assuming I learn I can't do without PS CS3.

How to convert case-sensitive to extended journal format

I have two apple computers (extended journal format) that have been backed up via a time capsule. I have just noticed that the TC is formatted as case-sensitive. I do not know why case-sensitive. In an effort to ensure consistency of file format then I seek to somehow remove case-sensitive formatting. I presume no/minimal underlying case-sensitivity issues within file names as source data is not formatted in case-sensitive manner.
I have tried SuperDuper to clone the TC to an external HDD but the application cloned the formatting in addition to the data.
I have attempted use of Disk Utility to copy content from source (TC) to destination (HDD) but this yielded error messages that noted different file format types.
It there a way to convert/remove case sensitive formatting from TC?
I appreciate that I could simply reformat TC to extended journal format but this would presumably erase all my backup data.
Any guidance most welcomed.

RossM wrote:
So I guess my choice is to "leave well alone" as Pondini suggests and accept the fact that cloning TC onto HDD has now formatted my new HDD as case-sensititive.
Actually, you may have two choices, depending on how you're going to be backing-up to the new HD:
Your best bet, by far, is to back up to it directly, rather than connecting it to the TC. That's much faster and more reliable. If so:
* Leave the TC backups alone. Reformat the HD as case-ignorant and let Time Machine start fresh on it. You can always see and restore from the old ones via the Browse... option, per Time Machine - Frequently Asked Question #17.
* Format the HD as case-sensitive and copy the backups from the TC to it. But don't copy the whole sparse bundle; copy the Backups.backupdb folder from the sparse bundle to the top level of the HD. (Sparse bundles are used only for network backups.) See #18 in the FAQ; you'll need the 4th procedure (copy network backups to be used locally.
But if you're going to connect the HD to the TC and back up to it that way, it doesn't matter how you format the HD, since the backups must be in a sparse bundle, that has its own format. Two choices for that:
* Leave the TC backups alone. Connect the HD to the TC and select it as the TM destination, and Let Time Machine start fresh on it. You can always see and restore from the old ones via the Browse... option, as above.   (There is a way to speed up the first backup; see the blue box in #Q2 of Using Time Machine with a Time Capsule.)
* Copy ("Archive") the TC's internal disk to the external HD, per the green box in #Q6 of the same article. Then select the external as your Time Machine destination via Time Machine Preferences.
Is this simply deferring a problem issue to another time (aagh)? Or to somehow try and remove this inconsistency and remove case-sensitive formatting from all tech items, even if this might mean reformatting and losing old backup data?
No. There's not really a problem, unless you change the case of file/folder names and try to restore the old ones to the same place via the TM browser, per the link in my earlier post. That's the only possible downside.
Does Time Machine require case-sensitive formatting on its destination drive?
No. It's the default, but case-ignorant is fine, unless you ever want to add a case-sensitive volume. Then you're in a pickle.
Or does Time Capsule only function witih case-sensitive formatting?
No. The TC's actual disk is case-ignorant; it's only the Time Machine sparse bundle that's case-sensitive by default.
The benefit of case-sensitive formatting as Apple default seems rather unclear to me
It's the default only for Time Machine backups. Everything else defaults to case-ignorant.
The advantage is, once you've been backing-up your internal HD for weeks, months, or years, and want to add a case-sensitive external HD to be backed-up, you can.   If the backups are case-ignorant, you can't.

HFS File system with case sensitive is not accepted to install creative cloud? Is there any other way but install the whole MacOS again after formatting the drive. I cannot belief that Adobe is so bad to it's Mac customers..

After many hours setting up OS10.10 from he scratch the last step should be installing m Adobe apps again.
trying this I always get the error message that creative cloud does not accept case sensitive file systems and I shall use another drive.
This means I have to set up the whole machine again after formatting without case sensitive but then having copy problems with my NAS?
I cannot belief that Adobe is really demanding this. If so this would show how urgent this market need alternatives and some more competition...

Hi,
You can refer below link for more information.
Error "Case-sensitive drives not supported" or similar install error | Mac OS

Which MAC OS EXTENDED format? journaled, case-sensitive?

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