Note, for hard drive model specific issues, see this tip: For data recover issues, see this tip: Mac OS 10.13, released September 25, 2017 has introduced a new file system, APFS: discusses using Disk Utility for the new file system. Note: when an SSD, or other solid state media (such as a USB stick or SD card) is used to install Mac OS 10.13 High Sierra or Mac OS 10.14 Mojave, it automatically chooses APFS. The side effect of this is that any older system than High Sierra, can't read the drive directly, unless it used shared via a networking protocol such as FTP. Mounting it via USB while booted off an older system renders the drive invisible. There is a way at least to bypass this automatic formatting in High Sierra: /Applications/Install macOS High Sierra.app/Contents/Resources/startosinstall -converttoapfs NO A command which is issued in the Terminal. Not for the faint at heart, but worth a try if you have a spare drive to test it on. Partitioning lets you specify the format of a drive when partitioning.
If you have an Intel Mac, you can see the end of this tip about several methods of partitioning. For backup solutions, see this tip: These common formatting options exist for hard drives and flash drives, which you may see, and are usable in the manner suggested: 1. ExFAT for non-Mac bootable but Mac OS X 10.6.5 or later read/write hard drives that can boot XP SP 2 or higher. For more on upgrading to 10.6.5 or later, see. FAT32 for non-Mac bootable, but any Mac OS read/writable 4 GB and under drives you can use with any version of Windows to boot Windows. NTFS for non-Mac bootable, but any Mac OS read-only without third party software larger hard drives you can use with any version of Windows to boot Windows.
Tuxera NTFS, Google's Macfuse, and Paragon Software NTFS-Mac are three options for making it writable by Macs. Some versions of Mac OS X offer NTFS support if you want to fiddle with superuser command line routines. If you are comfortable with such routines, and have a backup in case something goes wrong, I did find these routines, which I have not tested: 4. HFS+/GUID to boot Intel Macs, but not boot Windows, and not be readable by PowerPC Macs (pre-2006 601, 603, 604, G3, G4, G5). Needed to read from Windows without a network.
Note: Western Digital has noted some of their hard drives can't boot Intel Macs no matter what the formatting: GUID Macs support no erase partitioning, which still is only recommended with See the end of this tip for methods of partitioning. HFS+/Apple Partition Map /Journaled to boot PowerPC Macs with Mac OS X 10.2.3 or later if the Mac is older than the operating system, but not Windows. Macdrive needed to read from Windows without a network. HFS+/Apple Partition Map/not Journaled to boot any PowerPC Mac with Mac OS 8.1 or later if the Mac is older than the operating system, but not Windows.
Launch Disk Utility. Click the icon for your external hard drive in the sidebar on the left. Click the Erase tab along the top of the window. From the Volume Format menu, choose Mac OS Extended (Journaled). Enter a name for the external hard drive in the Name field. Click the Erase button. Do I really need to reformat my external hard disk to Mac DOS format to run in both Mac and Windows? Can we do the partition of hard disk without formatting it for both Mac & windows? File Systems: Is it good to format my external hard disk into FAT in order that it can be used both on my Mac and Windows PC?
Macdrive needed to read from Windows without a network. Note: for 5 & 6, there is limited support for above 128GB partitions on this article: Also Mac OS 9 formatting is needed for older boot of Mac OS 9, as is described here if formatting from Mac OS X on a Mac that can boot Mac OS 9: External drives may not be affected depending on how the bridge for the external drive was programmed. HFS Standard to boot Mac OS 8.0 or earlier Macs. Macdrive needed to read from Windows without a network.
You are only likely to run into 1 through 4 today. Very rarely will 5 - 7 appear. Notes: 4k Hard drives have been supported since Mac OS X 10.4 according to: SATA bus speeds that are higher than your computer's built in SATA bus may require a jumper to downstep to your computer's speed. A firmware update addresses the issue for some MacBook Pros: Only the 17' MacBook Pro, and Unibody model MacBooks support the 12.5mm height drives.
The rest require 9.5mm height drives. For CDs and DVDs, you are likely to run into 1. Joliet and UDF which is supported by (defunct as of 2012) Software Architect's ReadDVD (available for 10.4 and 10.5 PowerPC and Intel) in situations where the Mac operating system can't handle it directly. Unknown if it works with 10.6 Intel or later.
There is also 's UDF Media Reader, which is available for 10.4 & 10.5 PowerPC, and 10.7 Intel and later, and has been tested on 10.9 in this forum. It is unknown if it works with 10.6 and together with VLC can read VideoTS files for playback. ISO-9660 which is 100% crossplatform. 4 Formatted specifically for Mac files, which can't be read by Windows. Make sure you understand the data utilities you use and how they format or partition the discs in question to ensure your drive or disc is able to be used in the environment you desire.
Many of the Windows formatting solutions here work better when. 5 To date, no Mac has been built with Bluray support built-in. See if you wish to use Bluray.
6 Standard movie DVDs can open with Apple's DVD Player. Extras that are playable on a computer as an application either need InterActual's DVD Player, or to run Windows as is stated in item 3 above. Has a VLC video player that also can read some movie DVDs Apple's software can not. For both if the PRAM battery is over 4 years old, external devices and optical discs may start failing to work even before the system clock doesn't work properly anymore.
Not all Macs have a PRAM battery, some have a PRAM capacitor. Check with Apple support which your Mac has. Apple's articles on partitioning that can help you with formatting hard drives according to some of the formats above, depending on the version of Disk Utility, or installed operating system that came with Disk Utility. Apple Footer.
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When you have an external storage drive connected to your PC, such as a USB flash drive or hard drive, or even an SD Card that isn't working correctly because of data corruption or another serious issue. Many times the Format tool may not be able to fix the problem, and this is when DiskPart can come in handy. DiskPart is a powerful command-line utility that has been part of Windows for a long time, and it allows you to manage storage devices, partitions, and volumes with features that other tools such as Format or Disk Management can't fix.
In this, we'll walk you through the steps to use DiskPart to successfully clean, format, label, and assign a drive letter using the Command Prompt. How to use DiskPart to clean and format a drive Important: Using DiskPart will completely erase everything on the drive you select, making it impossible to undo any changes. It's crucial that you correctly choose the drive you want to clean and format. We always recommend making a. Use the Windows key + X keyboard shortcut to open the Power User menu and select Command Prompt (Admin). Connect the drive you want clean and format to your computer. Type the following command and press Enter: diskpart.
Type the following command to list all the available drives and press Enter: list disk. Take your time and very carefully, on the output from the previous command, identify the drive you want to clean. For example, in the screenshot below, we can see that we have four different drives listed, including Disk 0, which is 30GB, and we can quickly determine that it's the primary system drive. And because we're trying to clean an 8GB drive, we can easily spot that Disk 3 is the drive we need to select. Use the following command to select the drive and press Enter: select disk 3 Remember to change 3 in the command with the number of the drive you want to clean.
If you fail to choose the correct number will erase all the data from the wrong drive. Type the following command to clean the drive and press Enter: clean. Type the following command to double-check the drive still selected and press Enter: list disk If the drive still selected, you will notice an asterisk (.) next to the disk. Type the following command to create a partition and press Enter: create partition primary.
Type the following command to select the partition you just created and press Enter: select partition 1. Type the following command to set the partition active and press Enter: active. Type the following command to format the partition using NTFS and to set a label, and press Enter: format FS=NTFS label=WC-Drive quick Remember to change the WC-Drive in the command with the drive name you want to use. Type the following command to assign a drive letter and press Enter: assign letter=W Remember to change W in the command with a letter you want that isn't in use by another drive on This PC. Use the exit command to close DiskPart to complete the task. Again, using this guide, remember to take your time and carefully select the drive you want to repair.
If you have multiple external drives connected to your computer, it's a good idea to temporary disconnect them before proceeding to reduce the chances of erasing the wrong drive. Keep in mind that while there is many other tools to format a drive, DiskPart is likely to be your best choice when you're dealing with data corruption, drive inaccurately showing the storage capacity, and other serious problems. Have you ever used DiskPart on Windows? Tell us your experience in the comments below.