External Hard Drive Problem

[SohaibSdq]

Hello,
i have a external hard drive which i was use with my window laptop without any problem, now i bought macbook pro i connected my drive, but now i cant delete any file from my drive, i thought its because of file system. how can i solved this? attached a screenshoot of one partition info.

 

[chscag]

The external drive is formatted to NTFS and is therefore read only from your Mac. You need a third party driver in order to write to the drive. Why not just use Disk Utility to erase and format the drive as HFS+ for your Mac? If you don't want to completely erase the drive, then you need a third party driver. I recommend (Microsoft) Paragon NTFS.

 

[SohaibSdq]

The external drive is formatted to NTFS and is therefore read only from your Mac. You need a third party driver in order to write to the drive. Why not just use Disk Utility to erase and format the drive as HFS+ for your Mac? If you don't want to completely erase the drive, then you need a third party driver. I recommend (Microsoft) Paragon NTFS.

if i erase drive and format as HFS+ then will i use this drive with windows as well?
actually i want to use with both window and mac.

 

[chscag]

No. If you erase the drive and format it as HFS+, then you can only use it for your Mac. Instead, when you erase it, format it as exFat. Then you will be able to use it for both your Mac and PC Windows.

 

[SohaibSdq]

No. If you erase the drive and format it as HFS+, then you can only use it for your Mac. Instead, when you erase it, format it as exFat. Then you will be able to use it for both your Mac and PC Windows.

this sound good, can format exFAT in macbook stock disk utility or need any other third party application?

 

[akash.nu]

this sound good, can format exFAT in macbook stock disk utility or need any other third party application?

You won’t need any third party driver for that file format however FAT is restricted to a max of 4GB of file size.

Edit - apologies. I got confused with FAT32 filesystem. ExFAT seems to be ok for day to day use with 16eb.

 

[SohaibSdq]

You won’t need any third party driver for that file format however FAT is restricted to a max of 4GB of file size.

Edit - apologies. I got confused with FAT32 filesystem. ExFAT seems to be ok for day to day use with 16eb.

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You won’t need any third party driver for that file format however FAT is restricted to a max of 4GB of file size.

Edit - apologies. I got confused with FAT32 filesystem. ExFAT seems to be ok for day to day use with 16eb.

yeah FAT 32 file size limit is 4gb, is this apply in ExFAT as well? im confused can’t understand with it

 

[EugW]

exFAT does not have the 4 GB limitation.

However, I find exFAT support a bit flaky on the Mac. Never format the drive in the Mac. Use the Windows machine to format it, but even then sometimes after using it on a Mac, it may get seen as problematic when used on a Windows PC after using on a Mac.

BTW, this is not a MacBook issue so wrong forum.

 

[SohaibSdq]

The external drive is formatted to NTFS and is therefore read only from your Mac. You need a third party driver in order to write to the drive. Why not just use Disk Utility to erase and format the drive as HFS+ for your Mac? If you don't want to completely erase the drive, then you need a third party driver. I recommend (Microsoft) Paragon NTFS.

this one is paid, i need free one

 

[chscag]

this one is paid, i need free one

I do not recommend any of the so-called free NTFS drivers as they usually cause file corruption. Paragon NTFS is well worth the $19.95 US price since it's solid and does not cause file corruption. You can certainly try a free driver if you wish but make sure you have a good backup.

 

[akash.nu]

I do not recommend any of the so-called free NTFS drivers as they usually cause file corruption. Paragon NTFS is well worth the $19.95 US price since it's solid and does not cause file corruption. You can certainly try a free driver if you wish but make sure you have a good backup.

Couldn’t agree more.

Ps. Software requires time and effort and like anything else, that costs money.

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

exFAT format is the best way to go here.

If you have any worries about file corruption, big drives are so dirt cheap: buy a new drive for your Mac and have dedicated drives for each OS.

When you need to share a file between them, you can already "read only" from the NTFS drive you already have to get a file to the Mac. Send it back via a ton of cloud options like free Dropbox, free Google space, free space in Microsoft, a cheap USB stick, network storage at work, etc.

You could always leverage "bootcamp" on your new Mac and basically get your Windows computer moved "inside" of your new Mac. Then programs like Parallels and similar can be a way to leverage a single drive for both systems.

But all things considered, I'd use exFAT or spend much less than $100 for a dedicated hard drive for your new Mac and leave your NTFS drive exclusively for Windows use.

 

[cobracnvt]

+1 for Paragon NTFS