how to format my hard drive for windows and mac

If they’re not accounted for, and you eject the drive incorrectly, you’ll possibly lose data or corrupt the drive. While reading/writing to a drive, some information is cached – especially some quick small elements. There are many, many of us who professionally switch platforms, sometimes inside of the same day. On paper, it looks great, but no, I don’t think you should use it!Ī good rule of thumb? If you’re on a Mac, use HFS+/Mac OS Extended. It can be read/written by Mac or Windows and doesn’t have the limitation of 4GB like Fat32. ExFat (Extensible File Allocation Table).

It’s the most common Mac drive format – and also called MacOS Extended. Readable on both Mac and Windows, but only writeable on Windows. They read/write cross-platform, but a file must always be less than 4GB. Most of my thumb drives have been formatted from the factory. Yes, there are some others, but these are the ones you’re most likely to encounter. Here’s a shortlist of common drive formats.

How to format my hard drive for windows and mac