#Move ntsb files from an external hard drive to a hard drive for a mac windows

Your dad can check the format of his 4TB EHD by running Windows Explorer and selecting Computer in the left-hand pane.

#Move ntsb files from an external hard drive to a hard drive for a mac mac os x

Apple added read-only support for NTFS in 2003 with Mac OS X 10.3 (Panther) and many Mac users need it for running Windows under Boot Camp.

#Move ntsb files from an external hard drive to a hard drive for a mac Pc

Mac to PC file transfer using an ethernet cableД®ven if the 4TB drive has been formatted in WindowsвЂ™ NTFS (New Technology File System) format, then your Mac should still be able to read it, though it wonвЂ™t be able to write to it. Apple already supported FAT32 and it added support for exFAT in Mac OS X 10.6.5 (Snow Leopard) and later versions of OS X. All updated versions of Windows XP and later versions of Windows support both FAT32 and exFAT. If your dadвЂ™s new 4TB EHD (external hard drive) has been formatted in FAT32 or exFAT, then both his PC and your Mac should be able to read it. Hard drives will have to double in size another seven times to reach that. In theory, this can handle drives up to 64 zettabytes, though 512TB is the recommended maximum. However, hard drives keep getting bigger - now they are typically 500GB to 4TB - and in 2006, Microsoft released a new extended version, exFAT.

In 1996, Microsoft introduced FAT32 to handle much larger hard drives, and FAT32 is still in common use. When DOS was born, popular hard drives only had 5MB or 10MB of storage space, which you could fill today with a single animated GIF. Most operating systems can read files in these old formats. They tend to use a version of MicrosoftвЂ™s FAT file format, which dates back to the MS DOS (or IBM PC DOS) operating system used by the IBM PC in 1981. Macs and Windows machines do have their own preferred file formats for internal hard drives, but external hard drives donвЂ™t always ship with these pre-installed. The hard drives should not be a problem, unless your computers are very old. However, my Mac doesnвЂ™t recognise his hard drive, and his PC wonвЂ™t recognise my hard drive. I bought a 4TB hard drive for my dad, and thought it would be easy to copy the files over so he could use them on his PC. Enter an identifying name for your hard drive in the provided field and click вЂњEraseвЂќ to format the drive.I have a Mac and an external hard drive that includes some important family files. Select your hard drive from the list of devices, click the вЂњEraseвЂќ tab located along the top of the window and then select вЂњMac OS Extended (Journaled)вЂќ on the Volume Format drop-down menu. Click вЂњGoвЂќ on the main menu and select вЂњUtilities.вЂќ Click the вЂњDisk UtilityвЂќ icon to open Disk Utility. To format a drive in OS X Yosemite, connect the drive to your Mac and open the Finder application.

If your drive falls into the latter category, back up any data you want to keep before proceeding. Some drives may also need to be formatted if theyвЂ™ve previously been connected to a Windows PC.

If your external hard drive is new and has never been connected to a Mac before, you may need to format it in order to make it usable with your computer. Click вЂњEditвЂќ on the main menu at the top of your screen and select вЂњCopyвЂќ to copy items to your clipboard, or just press вЂњCommand-C.вЂќ Click вЂњEditвЂќ on the main menu at the top of your screen and select вЂњPasteвЂќ or вЂњPaste ItemвЂќ to transfer the items onto the hard drive at your current location - or just paste by pressing вЂњCommand-V.вЂќ You can also use copy and paste functionality on your Mac to manually copy and paste files from the computer onto the hard drive.