Nov 14, 2017 i recently purchased a 4tb wd my passport external hard drive from costco. Wd portable hard drive reformatting software for windows mac. Step 1 open finder, applications, then go to utilities and disk utility. Desktop external hard drives usually run at 7200 rpm to offer all the speed they can. All is set, then you can go ahead to format the drive on your mac. I just got a 1tb internal drive and now i want to use the external for my ps3. Reformatting 3tb wd my book for mac to windows external. Format wd my passport for mac, 10 quick steps mactakeawaydata. Wd my passport portable hard drive and auto backup software the my passport portable hard drive is trusted to store the massive amounts of photos, videos and music you love. A lot of people including you, storing important data on seagate external hard drive instead of on your pc mac hard drive. Click on the erase tab, choose your external hard drive and select mac os extended journaled and then click erase then simply drag and drop your data onto your newly formatted disk.
If a wd hard drive wont work normally on a mac due to bad sectors or other parameter errors, you can use wd drive utilities for mac to have a diagnosis what happens to your hard drive. Its fast 540 mbs read and write speeds are more than enough to transfer any file. Find low everyday prices and buy online for delivery or instore pickup. How to reformat passport external hard drive from read only to read and write for use with mac computersimportant. When it comes to external hard drives, many users choose wd my passport because of the rapid transfer rates and compact appearance design. Dec 07, 2009 this isnt really mac related but, is it beneficial to reformat an external hard drive. Reformatting an external hard drive macrumors forums. In order to reformat wd portable hard drive and permanently erase the data on the wd portable hard drive, we strongly recommend you to use this tool super eraser to help you reformat. Even though it sounds foolish, it could troubleshoot your corrupted external hard drive. For a hard drive to be able to be read and written to in both a pc and mac. Now either because of time, corruption or because it may have been formatted for a mac when i plug it into my pc i cant access it. Wd external hard drives are an excellent way to store and transport all your music, videos, pictures, and other important files. Connect your western digital my passport hard drive to your windows pc through the usb cable. If you are able to fix the hard drive or ssd in your mac or an external drive using disk utility you will hopefully be able to recover your files.
Format external hard drive for mac with disk utility. How to reformat my hard drive using my macbook air quora. Jan 08, 2020 you can only read your elements external hard drive. Hello all, i am switching completely from mac to windows. Need to reformat wd hard drive for mac if you connect your wd hard drive without reformatting, youll be unable to copy files to the disk as mac read only supports ntfs file system. How to reformat an external hard drive without losing your. Wait while first aid verifying and fixing possible errors of the wd hard drive.
How to format an external hard drive for a mac youtube. A western digital wd external hard drive can be used with any computer once it has been formatted by the computers operating system. There are specific thirdparty systems, like digital camcorders, and sony playstation 3, which need the drives to be formatted in either fat32 or exfat format to perform read from and. Hope this formatreformat a hard drive for mac guide helped. Formatting an external hard drive would erase everything on it. First of all, as i said before, reformating will erase all your data that stored on the hard drive permanently. You would have to copy the data on your hard drive to your mac, then reformat it with the disk utility application.
Open the disk utility app and highlight your external hard drive. Typically, when you buy an external hard drive it will be formatted out of the box. Apple may provide or recommend responses as a possible solution based on the information provided. Format usb drive, external hard drive on macos catalina. But unfortunately it bit the dust and i decided to get a pc.
First, lets see how to format an external hard drive or usb drive in macos which works with both mac and pc platforms, first plugin your drive in macos machine. Step 2 on the left side of the utilities screen, find the name of the external hard drive you want to format and select it. Yes, its recommended to format the drive on a windows computer. Format your western digital my passport external hard drive to fat32 or exfat format so to transfer the data between a mac and windows system conveniently. Step 2 follow the steps above to format the drive, and then you can use it with time machine on your mac system. How to reformat western digital portable hard drive. How to format usb driveexternal hard drive on macos catalina. Reformatting an external hard drive for mac step 1. How to format or partition an external hard drive for mac. Today, we will introduce an easy, secure and efficient way to reformat wd portable hard drive. I understand that the mac can readwrite this format. If you connect your wd hard drive without reformatting, youll be unable to copy files to the disk as mac read only supports ntfs file system.
Plug the cable attached to the wd external hard drive to the appropriate port on the mac, for example, the usb port. Plug in the external hard drive into mac and open the finder 2. How to repair corrupted external hard drive without losing. How to format an external hard drive with pictures wikihow. This reduced power draw helps preserve the battery life of the mac you plug the drive into. Please see the link below for instructions on how to format the drive on a windows computer. In such a case, its necessary to reformat wd hard drive to make it compatible with mac operating system. How to reformat an external hard drive for a mac techwalla. Formatting a wd external hard drive does not require any additional software. Format external hard drive for mac reformat external. To make your western digital hard drive work on both mac and windows. Apple likes to ensure these are easy to find, so they also appear in the finder in the lefthand column under devices, since macs treat them the same way as.
Oct 15, 2015 click on the erase tab, choose your external hard drive and select mac os extended journaled and then click erase then simply drag and drop your data onto your newly formatted disk. How to format a wd hard drive to exfat or fat32 file system. Below are some recommended internal hard drive and external hard drives that you might like. By default, the 4tb hard drive uses the ntfs format for windows pcs, but theres a help file included on the drive that provides information for mac users so that you can reformat the drive and.
How to format external hard drive to use on mac and pc. The prior generation mac wd hdd was much nicer in a silverish sleek enclosure. Usb drives and external hard drives on macos catalina are used for storing and backing up important data such as photos, videos, audios, images, notes, messages, music. Start the disk utility, located under applications utilities. You can have problems with your mac refusing to format your elements drive if its not picked at the right level. If they are important make sure you have them backed up safely and that they can be accessd on another drive s, cds, dvds or memory sticks if they are very small. Wd used to be in my view the leaders in storage solutions.
Bonus tip data recovery from formatted hard drive on mac. Highlight your drive and click partition in disk utility. Launch easeus partition master, rightclick the partition on your external hard driveusbsd card which you want to format and choose. Please keep in mind that reformatting will result in the loss of all the data on the hard drive so make sure you back up your data elsewhere before starting. How to format wd external drive for mac apple community. Nov 14, 2019 get a free addition to setapp the ultimate mac user book. I want to back up both on one external hard drive and have had a hard time finding one that works on both versions. The wd 2tb external hard drive setup is lightweight, compact, where you can store movies, music, pictures, office documents and take it with you wherever you go. If your product is not listed above, please visit the product page. This small compact ssd drive from samsung comes with both a usbc to usbc cable and a usbc to usba, meaning its perfect to use with your macbook or mac. You are ready to go in a few quick measures, so you can transfer your backup data to the hard disk, keep your documents safe so give you peace of mind. If i do reformat, i guess this is done through the erase tab in the disk utility. How to format a hard drive for both windows and mac.
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. Since the mac can read the old drive, an external drive formatted mac os extended could be attached as well. 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. Please note that reformatting the drive will erase all the information on the drive. Please see below on how to reformat your external hard drive on mac and windows. How to format external hard drive mac 2 simple methods revealed. How to fixrepair corrupted external hard drives on mac. Looking for an external mac hard drive that i can use on mac version 10. How to reformat to mac without losing files external. How to fix wd hard drive not recognized on mac without losing.
Hence, you must backup your important files before reformatting the drive if you want to save them. If you dont want to worry about losing all your data on the chance your external hard drive becomes corrupted, you should keep multiple backups of the data in different places. This latest hard drive well, its not very aesthetically pleasing. How to fix wd hard drive not recognized on mac without. 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.
The system requirements can be formatted ntfs for windows 7,8,10 and mac os x. Besides, wd my passport hard drives are built in with backup and encryption software which helps to ensure your data safety. The prior generation mac wd hdd was much nicer in a. Before that, remember to back up your external hard drive quickly with a highlyefficient data backup software since the formatting will erase all.
Reformatting external hard drive without apple community. Included wd discovery software makes it easy to back up your photos, videos and documents to the easystore desktop drive. Staples carries quality external hard drives that come with useful features and in various colors. How to reformat wd external hard drive using wd quick formatter. Wd discovery software can also be used to manage your drive settings like reformatting, led control and more. How to share an external hard drive between mac and windows. If your external hard drive is readonly on your mac due to its ntfs file system, you can easily fix it by reformatting the device to a mac compatible format with the builtin disk utility on mac. Feb 08, 2020 how to partition an external hard drive on mac. Ive been using my 500gb wd my book for a couple years as storage for media. 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.
The best ways to format an external drive for windows and mac. How can i reformat my external hard drive without losing. Download wd quick formatter to format external drive in. Should i just wait until i get the new laptop and attempt to reformat the drive on it. After a longtime use, you may want to erase a wd passport external hard drive for. Select the unrecognized wd hard drive from the sidebar. Reformatting is the best way to reset the western digital wd portable hard drive to factory status.
Select the format tab at the top of the new window that appears. Reformatting an external hard drive dell community. Simply plug your external hard drive slowly or quickly into the usb port and see if you can access this drive. For example, keep a backup on your local devices, and store backup copies with a cloud storage provider as well. Easytouse auto backup software easystore desktop storage comes equipped with wd backup software. Portable drives such as wd elements are available in a variety of speeds and storage capacities. So the first step you must do is move all of your important data to your pc mac, or to cloud storage service. They produced fantastic looking external hard drive enclosures and each year i would get a new one in their range. Nov 27, 2012 how to reformat passport external hard drive from read only to read and write for use with mac computersimportant. Step 1 connect the external hard drive you want to format to your mac, then start the disk utility app that you can find under applications utilities. Now, the erase dialogue window appears, here select the volume format dropdown list and choose msdos fat or exfat file system. How to format wd my passport for mac and pc easeus. How to reformat my external hard drive for windows 10. Pick your wd my passport in the external hard drive list.
Depending on a number of factors, however, your drive may be labeled not initialized. If first aid cant repair the wd hard drive, or disk utility doesnt recognize the volumes of the drive, probably, the. How to reformat mac external harddrive for pc march 2014. Wd my passport for mac portable external hard drive. Then the wd portable hard drive is able to securely be reused, resold, recycled or donated to other people. Reformatting an external hard drive no, not unless you back them up to another location first. Its because wd drive utilities is a specialized utility for wd hard drives to check for potential drive failures, slow disk performance, and bad sectors. Remember, once the data is gone, theres no way to recover it. A western digital external hard drive can be used on both windows and mac osx. Well show you everything you need to know about the. This is useful if a drive is being used under both operating system osto move files between the two environments.
Make sure your external hard drive is attached and mounted to. Since i use a mac, i need to reformat the hard drive in order for it to be used. How to format a wd external hard drive in fat32 to use in. Available in an array of vibrant, fun colors, the sleek style fits comfortably in the palm of your hand, so you can easily take your treasured content everywhere you go. Most of the time, when you connect an external hard drive to your macs usb port, you soon see it mount on the desktop. The reason is perhaps that seagate external hard drive has been well known for a long time as one of the most reliable drives for storing data. This formatting is also known as mac os extended journaled file system. I can find it under device manager and disk management but thats it. How to make external hard drive work with mac and pc set up guidehow to use hdhow to use hd duration. This is useful if a drive is being used under both operating system osto. It is usually used to repair corrupted hard disk when it is unrecognized or inaccessible, fix format issues when windows was unable to complete the format, change file system or optimize the performance of the drive. Wd 2tb external hard drive setup and driver download.
If you want to create multiple partitions on your external hard drive in fact, you should for better file organization, heres a stepbystep guide. How to write to an external hard drive on mac os x. How to erase wd my passport external hard drive in windows. How to format an external hard drive on windows and mac. How to reformat a wd external hard drive it still works. Hope this format reformat a hard drive for mac guide helped. Also, if your current hard drive is more than 5 years old, it probably is nearing the end of its service life and needs to be replaced. Connect the external drive or the usb drive to the mac.
External usb hard drives are lightweight, portable and inexpensive. Format an external hard drive or usb flash drive for mac os x. Apr 30, 2020 to format an external hard drive for mac with time machine, you must follow the steps below. Wd my passport 1tb portable external hard drive black. Name the wd external hard drive in the name text field at the top of the window.
How to format external hard drive mac 2 simple methods. They are great for backing up data, creating extra storage space on your computer and transferring large amounts of data between two or more computers. Click on your wd elements drive choose your wd elements external hard drive on your macs external drives list. Drive speed is measured in revolutions per minute rpm, based on how fast the drive can spin. Find the name of the drive in the left side of the utilities window and select it. Select a format type from the format type dropdown menu on the window, for example, ntfs or fat32. Choosing the right format for your external hard drive b. It is not as complicated to reformat an external hard drive for use with mac os x as it may look. Compare the different options for formatting an external hard drive to work with windows and mac.
Plug your western digital external hard drive into your computer using the usb cable that came with drive. The easiest way is to drag it from one drive to another. It helps to verify and repair a range of issues related to startup hd and external drive problems. You can only read your elements external hard drive. Or if you wish to be able to transfer back and forth pc to mac or mac to pc, select the fat32 format. How to reformat to mac without losing files external drives. This site contains user submitted content, comments and opinions and is for informational purposes only.
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