I would also like to boot from this ssd and put all my important apps on it. To format a hard drive on your mac, follow these instructions. Here are two outstanding mac hard drive format software tools you can rely on. Under file system box, select exfat for this drive. Unfortunately, disk utility in macos high sierra doesnt make that option easy to find.
On the left side of the window are the drives connected to the computer. Be sure to doublecheck this you could accidentally wipe the wrong drive if you select the wrong disk here. How to format external hard drive to use on mac and pc. The samsung ssd comes with exfat format by default. Once learning the right format to use for ssd on your system, the next step is to learn how to format ssd. This will format the drive as exfat format and your drive is now compatible with both platforms. Dec, 2019 now enter the name for the external drive which will be used after formatting and also select exfat for format option and click on the erase. In this video we look at the process of formatting a hard drive, flash drive, or ssd on an apple computer. Rightclick on the drive you want to format, click on format. Apr 16, 2020 if the inbuilt drive is set up ntfs file system in windows or apfs on macbook pro, then dont change it. Mar 15, 2018 windows cant normally read macformatted drives, and will offer to erase them instead. Here are plugable weve noticed common questions around formatting your ssd or hard drive on macos x 10.
How to format drive with compatible file system for mac and. Erase and reformat a storage device in disk utility on mac apple. Sentry mode will monitor activity around your car and if some one approaches without the fob, it activates the screen. Is the process the same for formatting a mac pro with a solid state drive as it is for one with a regular hard drive. How to replace macbook pros hard drive with an ssd how to transfer files from old hdd to new ssd duration. How to choose a file system fat, ntfs, apfs or mac os extension how to format a new ssd. Select your preferred values from the file system and allocation unit size dropdown menus. The sidebar now shows your disks devices and any containers. Compare the different options for formatting an external hard drive to work with windows and mac. If you see weird errors when using or formatting a drive internally on a mac especially after upgrading to a newer andor faster sata hard. If a wireless network is available, you can choose it from the wi.
If the ssd does not contain any important files and you want to delete all the data on the disk, you will need to use a drive formatting utility to format the drive for reuse. May 01, 2020 how to erase a disk for mac use disk utility to erase format a hard disk, ssd, flash drive, or other storage device. For windows, it offers quick format feature when you rightclick the hard drive. Fortunately, there are some mac hard drive format software or smart disk formatting applications can help you securely and easily format, reformat, or erase hard drive under mac os. So if you are formatting a drive that has already been used, be sure to copy any files you will ever want to see again onto a computer or backup drive. In mac os x, what is disk utility, and how do i use it. Windows cant normally read macformatted drives, and will offer to erase them instead. With a solidstate drive ssd, secure erase options are not available in disk utility. Both windows and mac os offer builtin disk formatting tool. Use disk utility to erase format a hard disk, ssd, flash drive, or other storage device.
I hope you enjoyed my article on how to make an external hard drive compatible with mac and pc without reformatting. Apr 30, 2020 to format an external hard drive for mac with time machine, you must follow the steps below. From what i understand, windows doesnt always like the way macs do the formatting on some larger drives, though, so give it a try and if your windows machines dont like it, just format the drive with windows. Formatting actually reformatting a solid state drive ssd is a quick and simple process to restore the drive to a clean state, similar to when the drive was new. Jan 23, 2020 i hope you enjoyed my article on how to make an external hard drive compatible with mac and pc without reformatting. Formatting actually re formatting a solid state drive ssd is a quick and simple process to restore the drive to a clean state, similar to when the drive was new. For instructions on how to format your hard drive on a mac, please reference the following links.
Then disk utility will quickly format the ssd on your mac. Mac hard drives usually come formatted in fat32, which will. How to format drive with compatible file system for mac. Oct 05, 2010 is the process the same for formatting a mac pro with a solid state drive as it is for one with a regular hard drive. If the drive is called no name, directly above that, you should see. Sep 29, 2017 if your mac can run macos high sierra or later, choose apfs formatting for the ssd. How to format an ssd drive formatting an ssd drive on mac os x verify that the ssd drive you want formatted is either installed in your computer. Need to format an external hard drive for mac and windows. The mac angle is not obvious in the g drive mobile ssd s design, though. This is enough to work the ssd as a backup drive for mac. Whether you go the software or hardware route depends on your situation. How to format an external hard drive for mac and windows. Instructions for how to format your external drive so that it will be fully usable in macos.
May 29, 2018 to format external drive to file system compatible with mac and pc, connect the drive to your computer and follow the detailed steps given below take formatting hard drive to exfat in windows 7 for example. How to reinstall macos from macos recovery apple support. If the inbuilt drive is set up ntfs file system in windows or apfs on macbook pro, then dont change it. The mac angle is not obvious in the gdrive mobile ssds design, though. Jan 15, 2020 learn how to use macos recovery to reinstall the mac operating system on your builtin drive or an external drive. A drive can be formatted with exfat using either a windows or a mac computer. And they will never cause any damage to your hard drive or shorten the service life of the hard drivessdusb flash drive, etc. I have already used disk utility to format it to mac os extended journaled.
Sep 26, 2018 need to format an external hard drive for mac and windows. The easiest way to do that is hit cmd and the spacebar at. Jun 02, 2017 in this video we look at the process of formatting a hard drive, flash drive, or ssd on an apple computer. In the main interface, right click the partition on that need. Whether you simply prefer the speed of an ssd or use both mac and pc on a regular basis, this drive offers formatting that works everywhere you go and top notch readwrite rates. Give the drive a descriptive name and leave the default settings. If you want to recycle a ssd, formatting is the best way to remove all history data from the ssd. For most reasons to erase, including when reformatting a disk or selling, giving away, or trading in your mac, you should erase your entire disk.
Now enter the name for the external drive which will be used after formatting and also select exfat for format option and click on the erase. Format a usb drive as exfat for mac and windows compatibility. The below steps for formatting external drive is for windows 10 and also. To format external drive to file system compatible with mac and pc, connect the drive to your computer and follow the detailed steps given below take formatting hard drive to exfat in windows 7 for example. Exfat is an upgraded version for the fat32 file system that limits the maximum file size to 4gb. 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. Then select disk utility from the utilities window and click continue. In disk utility, select the ssd not the partition under, then select partition button on top of disk utility. How to format a hard drive on windows or mac avast. Should i reformat with apfs or mac extended journaled.
How to format a new internal ssd in macos high sierra. How to format a hard drive for both windows and mac. Open finder to verify that the ssd drive displays in your list of devices. These steps can be used for both internal and external drives. For example, here wed type select disk 2 finally, type clean and press enter. You can also create multiple partitions in one ssd. How to format external hard drive mac 2 simple methods revealed.
Format ssd for mac while formatting an ssd on mac, just make sure that you select its file system format carefully. Mar 29, 2019 rightclick on the ssd drive, then select format. For more security, consider turning on filevault encryption when you. Place a checkmark next to perform a quick format, then click on ok. Select the capacity of the drive respective to the one containing the device you wish to format then click the erase tab. A solid state drive is primarily used on mac machine. Formatting a drive so you can install and boot macos requires the guid partition map. This is a great thing to do when you first purchase a drive or when you are looking to. Clone the data from old hard drive to the newly installed ssd formatting and data migration 2. Formatting an ssd is very simple as long as you use a professional drive formatting tool. How to add a fast new ssd to your old mac or macbook for. Put backup cd in drive reboot system and hold down c for 10 seconds in the mac os x installer open up disk utility highlight disk, go to partition, erase partition quit disk utility. The only difference between a mac hard drive and a pc hard drive is what file system its formatted in.
Click on the erase button to confirm your choice and wait as the ssd drive would be formatted. Then restore directly from your time machine backup. Hard drive format software for mac mac disk format software. You will need to partition and format the drive for use on your system so that it can be mounted as a usable storage volume. Disk utility is a useful application inside your mac system. Either way there is a solution to having an existing external hard drive for mac and pc. How to format external hard drive mac 2 simple methods. How to convert a macformatted drive to a windows drive. If it says guid partition table, you can format the drive by selecting mac os x extended journaled in the format popup menu, giving the drive a name, and then clicking erase. If the drive is called no name, directly above that, you should see the drive capacity of xxxx. If your mac can run macos high sierra or later, choose apfs formatting for the ssd. Apple mac upgrades ram, ssd flash, external drives and more.
If you install an ssd on a mac, its important to make sure that the trim command is running on the machine. First, back up the data on the macformatted drive if you have anything important on it. How to format a hard drive or ssd in macos youtube. If you have a mac lying around, you can plug the drive into a mac and back up the files. A big silver g on the front and hints of bright blue under a faux grille make this drive look more like a movie prop than a. Best external drives for mac and pc interchangeable 2020. Choose view show all devices from the menu bar in disk utility.
Please note that once the hard drive is formatted by aweeraser for mac, all the data on the hard drive will be permanently erased, cant be recovered by data recovery software or. In disk utility, select the ssdnot the partition under, then select partition button on top of disk utility. If you are doing a fresh install of os x on the ssd, which you should, you can use the setup assistant system when your mac first reboots to the new install of os x to copy all you files, including user accounts, settings and app over from your original standard hard drive that you put in the optical bay. The reason for this is that the ssd drive can be used on a variety of platforms windows, mac os x, linux, unix, etc. Step 2 follow the steps above to format the drive, and then you can use it with time machine on your mac system. Dec 29, 2015 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.
Instead, well just be wiping the drive and starting over from scratch. Now it is not a mac ssd so i believe i will need to format it is some way to make it work in my macbook pro. This also allows you to restore time machine backups on windows. Bonus tip data recovery from formatted hard drive on mac. The best ways to format an external drive for windows and mac. They will efficiently format hard drive or external device under windows or mac os. Formatting will delete everything present on your drive. Formatting the ssd can quickly clear all the data on the disk. External hard drive compatible with mac and pc without. As the following popup window would be launched, you can select the file format and the partition scheme for the drive. After you click erase, the erase will start and the partition you created will appear under the drive on left side of disk utility. And they will never cause any damage to your hard drive or shorten the service life of the hard drive ssd usb flash drive, etc. Format your external drive with exfat for both mac and. If a locked door is opened, the alarm sounds and the audio system blares.
Learn how to use macos recovery to reinstall the mac operating system on your builtin drive or an external drive. If youre having trouble formatting a new ssd in a mac, it could be the. Screenshot by dong ngo if you have replaced the hard drive on your mac with an ssd. How to erase a disk for mac use disk utility to erase format a hard disk, ssd, flash drive, or other storage device. The drive is small, portable, and sleek available in multiple colors. The ssd will work for both windows and mac out of the box. If you know youre going to use a drive on both mac and windows, you. This command erases the entire selected disk, including all its files and partitions whether. It will list all hard drives and external hard drives on the mac.
Turn on your macintosh notebook computer or desktop system and login. Run aweeraser for mac choose erase hard drive select hard drive click on erase button format the selected hard drive. How to add a fast new ssd to your old mac or macbook for only. How to initialize sandisk ssd on mac systems via usb. Although disk utility should always be tried first, a macs terminal can be used to format the drive in these cases. So, if you want to use an external hard drive on both windows and mac, you need to format it to a filesystem that is compatible with windows pc and mac. This process wont actually convert the file system. To format an external hard drive for mac with time machine, you must follow the steps below. If you are looking to sell or donate your old drive, you will want to not only reformat your drive, but also erase all the data in a separate action. If you want to format a drive that will be used as your macs startup disk, the procedure is a little different from formatting it for use as a. How to format external ssd for mac time machine mashtips. Step 1 open finder, applications, then go to utilities and disk utility. Select disk utility, and then choose the drive to format.
612 1593 146 1248 1538 1155 1455 707 78 923 210 206 531 872 1220 1242 1234 1011 1299 774 896 409 957 486 708 109 1168 164 881 219 944 1026 1077 1282 1238 1342 473 1277