11/12/2020 0 Comments How To Format A Windows Drive For Mac
How long this takes will depend on how many files you have on the drive, how much storage the drive holds, and which security settings you chose.Fortunately, macOS has simple built-in tools that make it super easy.In this article, well show you how to format a USB drive for use with Windows, Time Machine compatibility, or simply to erase it.Using Disk Utility To Format A USB Drive The simplest way to format a USB on macOS is through the Disk Utility.
Depending on which Mac youre using, you may need to use a flash drive that has a USB C socket or an adapter from USB A to USB C. Make sure that there are no files on the drive that you wish to keep because the formatting process will erase everything on the drive. Next, press command spacebar to pull up Spotlight, type Disk Utility, and hit return. In the sidebar of Disk Utility, click the USB drive you want to format and then click Erase in the toolbar at the top of the window. A dropdown menu should appear asking you to rename your drive. You can name it anything you like, or simply leave the name the same Next, choose the format that youre going to reformat the drive to. Youll see the drives current format already selected, like so: If youre not sure which format to choose, here are some pointers: APFS (Apple File System): This is a relatively new drive format from Apple that is now macOSs default. Format A Windows Drive Software Older ThanHowever, its not readable by a non-Apple machine (meaning you cant plug the drive into a Windows or Linux computer) and Macs running software older than High Sierra wont be able to read the drive. Mac OS Extended (Journaled): This was the default Apple drive format before APFS. You cant move files to a drive using this format on Windows computers either, but you can view the files on it on a Windows computer, which is a small point for compatibility. Mac OS Extended (Case-sensitive, Journaled): This is the same as Mac OS Extended (Journaled), with the exception that you can give your drive a case-sensitive name (Flash Drive) instead of an all-uppercase name (FLASH DRIVE). MS-DOT (FAT): This file format comes with a big benefit and a big drawback. ![]() However, MS-DOT (FAT) only allows files that are 4GB or less. ExFAT: The same as MS-DOT (FAT) except that it supports files over 4GB in size. NTFS: This is the Windows equivalent to APFS; its Windowss default drive format. A Mac computer can read files on an NTFS drive, but it can not write files to that drive. Finally, theres Security Options: This brings up a slider where you can choose how deleted the files you erase from your drive really are. On the least secure option, a sophisticated program would be able to recover the deleted files, and on the most secure option, it would be more or less impossible for anybody to recover the files. If youre not in a rush, the most secure option is obviously best, though you should be safe on the least secure setting, unless you have particularly sensitive data on the drive. All thats left to do is press erase Once you do this, Disk Utility will erase all of the data on your drive and format it to your format of choice.
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