The current version of time machine supports apfs only as a source disk, not as a destination. How to format or partition an external hard drive for mac. How to format a hard drive for both windows and mac youtube. Formatting time capsule as an ntfs drive on vista ars. Using a 2 tb external drive for time machine backups of a mac with a 128 gb solidstate drive doesnt make much sense. Jan 27, 2019 to format the drive to work with both platforms you will need use a windows computer to format the disk as exfat. Create an exfat partition on the airport time capsule to store the files you want. How to use a time machine drive for both file storage and backups. However i have files that are around 8gb size or so on, that i need to backup and fat32 does not support. Formatting time capsule as an ntfs drive on vista 7 posts. Youll learn stepbystep how to format and set partitions on an external hard drive.
Apple enthusiasts love the sleek design and easy user interface of the companys devices. From the very start, exfat was designed as the goto format for data backup, storage, and transfer. Formatting external hard drive and setting up time machine for mac. Fat32 works for both oses, but has a 4gb size limit per file, so it. Jan 02, 2020 you can drag and drop or copy and paste your files to the time capsule. Exfat format mac and windows exfat has been around for. The reason that im asking is that i remember people recommending not using exfat formatted by a mac in the past. You can drag and drop or copy and paste your files to the time capsule.
Video editors will often find that they need to share files between a pc and a mac. I have a seagate 2tb external hdd usb2 full of videos and would at some point like to transfer to a larger hdd 3tb but utilizing the latest thunderbolt tech when it arrives and. Jan 02, 2017 to create our shared partition, we will shrink the mac backup partition. Dec 22, 2017 when you set up time machine, your mac wants to use an entire external drive exclusively for backups. Enabling time machine for a usb hdd with ntfs ask different. Apr 09, 2012 my brother upgraded to a 3tb apple time capsule and gave me his old 500gb time capsule. Time machine supports all mac os extended journaled formats and xsan formats.
Sep 25, 2014 any reason not to format an external drive with exfat. Hi, i have a windows 8 partition and mac os mountain lion partition on my macbook pro. Format external hard drive for mac and pc with exfat. Use time machine on an exfat hard drive with a sparse bundle. Why you cant just pop the drive and put in another one i dont understand, but meanwhile, i want to reformat or reset the older unit so i can make it my own and set it up in my dorm room. Theyll have to set the time capsule as a target in their own time machine, i believe. I want to backup my videos and movies to time capsule, but it hard drive in fat32 and i cant store files larger than 4 gb. Native ntfs support can be enabled in snow leopard, but is not advisable, due to instability. Not to mention, converting from an airport to the time capsule was painless and took less then 5 minutes. If you connect a disk formatted for windows, it can be reformatted permanently removing all data to a mac format and used as a backup disk. A windows computer that natively reads can share it to the network.
Verify, repair, or erase an airport time capsule drive. While macos can mount and interact with hard drives formatted as fat or exfat, time machine cant deal with them. A time machine drive must have ignore ownership permissions off, whereas by default the mac mounts external drives with ignore ownership permissions set to on. Heres how you can get around that and use a time machine drive both for backups and file storage. I am referring to using the disk utility in mac os to do the formatting. Hi, i have a apple time capsule with 3 tb hard drive. I was told that only fat32 and exfat can be used for read and write in both mac and windows,i wonder if there is another format,as i know,the fat32 is old and functional limited,the exfat is better but it seems that this format may be much slower while transporting. When you set up time machine, your mac wants to use an entire external drive exclusively for backups. How can i format an external hard drive to be used with. Also, i have itunes media folder already stored on the external hd. Formatting a storage device as mac os extended with journaling is recommended, as it may provide some more resilience if the device is removed or powered down while in use. Access hdd with ntfs partition and timecapsule apple. Connect the usb fash drive to the mac os x computer. You can also make the files partition an exfat partition, which.
Because my hard drive died and i had to put in a new one. My brother upgraded to a 3tb apple time capsule and gave me his old 500gb time capsule. I was in a quandry i needed to do a hard reset, and then reformat the drives without disrupting my existing wifi network. Partition your time machine drive use with windows. While macs can back up to a networked time machine destination, including a time capsule, all drives backed. Go to applications utilities double click and open disk utility. And they should format the usb drive exfat for better we recently dismissed our marketing person and he used a mac desktop and it backed up constantly to a time capsule. In this guide were using exfat instead of fat32, another filesystem that both windows and mac can read and write to, because fat32 has a maximum 4gb file size limit whereas exfat.
At the time of the original posting in 2011, there were some problems getting a mac formatted exfat drive working with windows, it had trouble recognizing those drives. To create our shared partition, we will shrink the mac backup partition. I can see it as a network drive, but i do not see the same format option as with any other drive. Partition a hard drive for macos time machine and windows 10. Which format in harddisk partition do you think is the. Using time machine on unsupported volumes mac os x hints. However i have files that are around 8gb size or so. Create an exfat partition to share files between macos and windows 10.
Quickly format an external hard drive for mac and windows pc. How to format a drive for mac and pc compatibility macyourself. Fat32 file allocation table readwrite fat32 from both native windows and native. When you set up time machine, your mac wants to use an entire external. How can i format an external hard drive to be used with time. How to restore mac files from a time capsule to windows 10. Formatting your hard drive with exfat is a great way to make it usable.
Give the partition a name and select exfat for the format. Apr 03, 2011 if you use your stick also on windows machines running xp sp2, vista sp1 or windows 7 you can use the very new file system exfat. To format the drive to work with both platforms you will need use a windows computer to format the disk as exfat. This comes in handy if you are using a macos computer with time machine. How to use a time machine drive for both file storage and. To create our shared partition, we will shrink the mac backup. Choose a different disk or reformat the disk in mac os extended journaled format. I wanted to use time machine on my exfat hard drive, but turns out that these volumes arent supported from time machine. Jun 16, 2015 heres how to set up an external hard drive for mac and pc, time machine backup and file storage. But i did not format it because i have no adapterconnector to format the disk with my mac. There is a very simple way to use time machines on unsupported hard drives, as long as you follow these instructions carefully you shouldnt have any issues at all. Formatting your hard drive with exfat is a great way to make it usable between both windows and os x. Jun 22, 2016 exfat is an improved version of fat32.
But neither format is great for mac as ntfs is read only, without extra software and exfat is still fat. Backup your mac to an external hard drive yet setting up a backup of your mac can be frustrating since most external hard drives must be formatted before being used. Using an external drive between mac and windows computers can be a. Read only ntfs from native mac os x to readwrite format ntfs from mac os x. How to set up external hard drive for mac and pc, time. Select the new untitled partition so we can format it as exfat for use with both mac and windows. I unplugged my 1tb time capsule last year and i plan on selling it.
Time capsule is the hardware network target hard disk for time machine to back up to do you mean that or time machine which is the software in the mac. If you can see your drive in disk utility but were not able to mount and use it, you might have a disk format problem. It is also the only option that will work with time machine and time capsule, so if you want to use the drive for time machine backups or attach it to a time capsule to access files over the network, you must use this format. Exfat should basically only be used on drives that need to work with both windows and macos computers. The winner of the best wireless external hard drive for mac is the wd my passport wireless pro. Select your airport time capsule in the airport utility window. Use the exfat file system and never format your external. Feb 08, 2020 how to partition an external hard drive on mac. If you want to create multiple partitions on your external hard drive in fact, you should for better file organization, heres a stepbystep guide. Can you use an apfsformatted mac with a preapfs apple time. The following tutorials will teach users how to format an external hard drive for both mac and pc to exfat on mac osx and windows 10. Will time capsule recognize an exfat form apple community. If you want to back up with time machine but access your backup from windows, its possible to.
Types of disks you can use with time machine on mac apple support. Access hdd with ntfs partition and timecapsule apple macos. Time machine backup can fully restore a dead drive although booting the mac from usb will be necessary if you have lion. The reason that im asking is that i remember people recommending not using exfat formatted by a mac in the past, but that was at least 2 or 3 years ago, probably longer. Is it possible to backup both of these on to one external hard drive. This was discussed in wwdc 2016, and appears to still be true. The only mac user in our house no longer lives here, so we have no use for it any more, and that user didnt wantneed the unit. Join the wifi network your time capsule is connected to, or connect an ethernet cable between your mac and your airport time capsule. Hi guys, i hear that if i stuck a windows ntfs external hdd 2tb to the imac it will only read the data. Wireless external hard drive for mac need to knows b4u buy.
While macs can back up to a networked time machine destination, including a time capsule. Open the disk utility app and highlight your external hard drive. The file system architecture was made for the best external hard drives. Best for external drives shared with windows computers. If you select an ntfs or fatformatted disk, time machine prompts you to reformat the disk. Many people do not realise that you can partition your external hard drive. You can use this format if it is supported by all computers with which you intend to share the drive.
Format external hdd for mac and windows exfat partition hdd. Any reason not to format an external drive with exfat. Look and see if your external drive is listed as ntfs format, if so you want to reformat the drive using the erase function in disk utility and format it as exfat, fat, apfs if supported or mac os extended. The software is designed to work with the time capsule storage product as well as other internal and external devices it was introduced in mac os x leopard and snow leopard. How to format a hard drive for both windows and mac. Partition a hard drive for macos time machine and windows. Any reason not to format an external drive with exfat mac. If you use your stick also on windows machines running xp sp2, vista sp1 or windows 7 you can use the very new file system exfat. Can not backup windows 7 to shared mac drive microsoft. It isnt as efficient as ntfs windows but is cross compatible between windows os and mac os since 10. How to format usb flash drive to fat32 in mac os x admfactory.
Backup disks you can use with time machine apple support. Unfortunately exfat is only supported on mac os 10. May 28, 2009 i unplugged my 1tb time capsule last year and i plan on selling it. As youll see, however, knowing how to back up a mac to. Install ntfs3g for mac os x free some have reported problems using tuxera approx 33usd. Top rated external hard drive for mac mactakeawaydata. The offsets for the fat and the cluster heap is adjustable at format time, so that writes to these areas will happen in as few flash blocks as possible. Dec 29, 2015 select the new untitled partition so we can format it as exfat for use with both mac and windows. Yet setting up a backup of your mac can be frustrating since most external hard drives must be formatted before being used. Select the drive you want to format and click erase button.
May 21, 2018 in this guide were using exfat instead of fat32, another filesystem that both windows and mac can read and write to, because fat32 has a maximum 4gb file size limit whereas exfat can work with. How to format hard drive for mac and windows and do partition for time machine backup. Go to finder application utilities double click for disk utility select the external hard disk you wish to format at the left column click on the erase tab at the volume format select msdos file system if you confirm to format your hard disk for mac and windows, click on erase button. Windows and mac with time capsule i have had a 1 tb time capsule for a little over two weeks and think it is one of the easiest network storage device i have ever used. Use these steps to format external hard drives for both operating systems. Which format in harddisk partition do you think is the best.
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