Now, a new hard drive icon will appear on the desktop. Free download western digital fat32 formatting tool for. For a hard drive to be able to be read and written to in both a pc and mac. Formatting an external hard drive would erase everything on it. Mac cant read wd elements external drives for mac wd. Highlight your drive and click partition in disk utility. Mar 29, 2019 how to format a hard drive on mac to work on mac and pc.
Formatting a wd external hard drive does not require any additional software. My question is how do i reformat my wd harddrives that are set up for windows, without losing any of my files. Apr 14, 2020 by this way, you can easily format an external hard drive for mac and pc without losing any data. Whether you are trying to backup mac to an external hard drive, wipe out any personal information and sell the computer, or even use a new operating system, you need to format the hard drive on your mac or pc. When the finder window opens, on the menu bar, select go and then utilities. Click on the erase button to start erasing the external hard drive or usb. Quickly format an external hard drive for mac and windows pc. How to format external hard drive to use on mac and pc. Mar 22, 2012 the best ways to format an external drive for windows and mac.
Note that using a drive frequently between windows and mac could increase the chances of file corruption, so make. Moving files from macformatted external hard drive to pc. Once the wd external hard drive has been formatted, it can be used like any other hard drive that is attached to the computer. While its convenient to purchase the hard drive that will work with your computer right out of the box, most external hard drives can also be reformatted so youre not limited to your initial choice. Easily format wd my passport portable hard drive on mac. How to format new hard drive on windows 10 windows central. In the next 5 minutes read, you will master yourself in formatting a wd my passport safely and in a manner best suited for sharing your digital files between a macos and windows os. How to format a wd hard drive to exfat or fat32 file system. How to convert a macformatted drive to a windows drive. Erase the mac partitions, including the efi system partition. Two easy methods to format wd my passport portable hard drive on mac. You can only read your elements external hard drive. This answer explains how to format a wd drive for use on windows and macos. My passport wont format external drives for mac wd community.
This is useful if a drive is being used under both operating system osto. Connect your western digital my passport drive to mac computer, and let the os detect and mount the drive for use. The easiest way is to drag it from one drive to another. Please remember that all data will be deleted from the drive, so make sure you have made a backup. Plug the cable attached to the wd external hard drive to the appropriate port on the mac, for example, the usb. Out of the both its not mac compatible, but you can format it for use. Compare the different options for formatting an external hard drive to work with windows and mac.
How to share an external hard drive between mac and windows. How you format a mac hard dr ive is entirely dependent on what kind of drive you plan on formatting. However, if you want to convert ntfs to exfat to make external hard drive compatible with mac and pc, 3 steps are required. Feb 08, 2020 how to partition an external hard drive on mac. You can format an external hard drive or thumb drive to work seamlessly with both mac and windows by using the exfat file system. Format wd elements for mac and pc have your drive for both. Mac os journaled is the formatting option for mac and ntfs or msdoc is the. How to format or partition an external hard drive for mac. Tutorial on how to format a western digital elements harddrive for a mac. Format wd my passport for mac, 10 quick steps mactakeawaydata.
In the format partition section, select the file system. Apr 16, 2020 step 6 once formatting completes, you can then use your drive in mac as a usual hard drive part 3. First to format your wd elements external drive to mac os extended journaled file system. Dec 25, 2016 if you want to transfer files from a mac to windows pc and vice versa using an external portable hard drive then you have to have the external drive formatted in a file system both oss can read. Two ways for reformatting wd hard drive for mac and pc.
This thing is still unknown for many users but doesnt worry its not complex. How to format a hard drive windows 10, 8, 7, vista, xp. I know i am supposed to format it for mac via disk utility before i can use it, but this process also fails. Aug 16, 2019 try selecting the wd at the hard drive level i. After realizing that you can reformat wd hard drive to fat32 or exfat to make it compatible with mac os x and still can be used under windows, it is time to check out how to reformat wd hard drive for mac and pc in windows successfully. Then your western digital external hard drive is ready to use on your mac and on your windows pc. Mar 12, 2018 want to format a hard drive for mac and pc compatibility. Name the wd external hard drive in the name text field at the top of the window. For instance, is the hard drive internal or external. Select a format type from the format type dropdown menu on the window, for example, ntfs or fat32. If you want to create multiple partitions on your external hard drive in fact, you should for better file organization, heres a stepbystep guide. I currently have a windows laptop that i use and will be upgrading to a imac very soon. Starting clean how to format new hard drive on windows 10 formatting is an essential task before starting to use a new drive, and in this guide, well show you how to do it on windows 10. You can format a western digital my passport external hard drive to exfat or fat32 format using.
You have to set it up correctly before getting starting. If you worry about losing data from this hard drive, you can recover lost data with iboysoft mac data recovery at first. Of course, there are more than two methods that can help you format a wd my passport portable hard drive under mac os. Then, you can share external hard drive between mac and pc. Vishal updated on april 21, 2020 mac hard drive recovery 15 comments 6 min read. Select the format tab at the top of the new window that appears. Before continuing, make sure that you have a backup of any files that you want to keep. A western digital external hard drive can be used on both windows and mac osx. To make your western digital hard drive work on both mac and windows computers, you need to format the drive with the fat32 file system. How you format a mac hard drive is entirely dependent on what kind of drive you plan on formatting. Feb 03, 2020 use disk utility to erase format a hard disk, ssd, flash drive, or other storage device. How to format a hard drive for both windows and mac. Please see below on how to reformat your external hard drive on mac and windows.
Mar 31, 2020 if you buy a new external hard drive, you may notice that working between mac and pc is an often difficult but it doesnt need to be. Connect it, power it up, go to disk utility in applicationsutilities, select the wd disk on the left, go to the erase tab, and choose mac os. It allows you to format wd hard disk to fat32, exfat, ntfs, ext2, ext3, etc. How to fix wd my passport for mac hard drive not mounting. The instructions below are for windows 10, but other versions of windows from windows 7 and up can also format an external drive as exfat for use with mac as well. Erasing a disk or volume permanently deletes all of its files. How to format wd external drive for mac apple community. Some people are asking for a way to format a hard drive for mac. Dec, 2019 you can format the external hard drive or usb drive to make it compatible with both mac and windows machines. Want to format a hard drive for mac and pc compatibility. My question is whether i should just start using as is and skip the formatting step, which would mean not erasing the current content on the hard drive. How to format wd my passport for mac and pc easeus.
Proceed based on whether youre erasing your startup disk or some other disk. This tool allows you to manage the partitions on drives connected to your computer internal ones or external ones connected via usb. The best ways to format an external drive for windows and mac. Apr 16, 2020 can i use wd hard drive on mac and pc. If you buy a new external hard drive, you may notice that working between mac and pc is an often difficult but it doesnt need to be. If your external hard drive is readonly on mac because it was formatted with microsoft ntfs file system, you can free download iboysoft ntfs for mac and feel free to copywriteeditdelete and transfer files on this drive without formatting it. Wd my passport this time not untitled and then erase.
Because mac os x mountain lion does not natively support writing to an external ntfs drive, you must erase your hard disk and format it using a compatible file system. Format external hard drive for mac with disk utility. Oct 25, 2018 to format western digital external hard drive fat32, you actually have a better choice. You were right, you did indeed have to select wd my passport screen shot 20170625 at 6. Can i use a wd elements external hard drive on my mac. In such a case, its necessary to reformat wd hard drive to make it compatible with mac operating system. Hence, you must backup your important files before reformatting the drive if you want to save them. Mac os x and windows can both read and write to disks in the fat or exfat format. All is set, then you can go ahead to format the drive on your mac. Formatting a hard drive will take a while and wait for it patiently. Dec 29, 2015 your exfatformatted drive or partition can now be used for both windows and mac. As it is mentioned above, after formatting a hard drive, all data on the hard drive will be erased.
Open the disk utility app and highlight your external hard drive. Pick your wd my passport in the external hard drive list. Connect it, power it up, go to disk utility in applicationsutilities, select the wd disk on the left, go to the erase tab, and choose mac os extended. Here i recommend you to change the file system of the wd hard drive from ntfs to fat32 or exfat, thus the wd hard drive is able to be used.
Your disk utility program lives within a folder called utilities. This article analyzes why the wd my passport for mac hard drive is not mounting on mac and how to fix this issue. Wd external hard drive set up guide how to use on mac. However, all of the solutions can be divided into two types. If your product is not listed above, please visit the product page. Choose your wd elements external hard drive on your.