readyshare format 8tb for both macos 10.13 High Sierra and windows 8.1

[lsolesbee]

i have a Netgear N600 WiFi Cable Modem Router Model C3700 which has a USB port for a network drive. I have a Seagate Backup Plus Hub 8TB drive. I want it to be accessible by both Macs and Windows PCs. Primary mac is MacBookPro 2014, macos 10.13.6 High Sierra, and PC is windows 8.1, also secondary Mac Pro 2008 macos 10.9.5, and PC with winxp... Netgear only accepts FAT16, FAT32 NTFS XFS HFS HFS+ formats.
FAT32 has size problems. Netgear does not accept exFAT.
WHAT FORMAT CAN I USE TO BE READ/WRITABLE BY BOTH MAC AND PC?

I tried format FAT(DOS) using Disk Utility,App but it only made 1.4TB available of the 8TB drive

 

[Bigwaff]

You’ll have to read the Netgear router manual to determine which file system formats the router recognizes with ext USB drives. Most likely NTFS for drive format while the router will share the drive over the network using SMB. All Windows and Macs can access SMB network file shares. But read the manual.

 

[AlixSPQR]

i have a Netgear N600 WiFi Cable Modem Router Model C3700 which has a USB port for a network drive. I have a Seagate Backup Plus Hub 8TB drive. I want it to be accessible by both Macs and Windows PCs. Primary mac is MacBookPro 2014, macos 10.13.6 High Sierra, and PC is windows 8.1, also secondary Mac Pro 2008 macos 10.9.5, and PC with winxp... Netgear only accepts FAT16, FAT32 NTFS XFS HFS HFS+ formats.
FAT32 has size problems. Netgear does not accept exFAT.
WHAT FORMAT CAN I USE TO BE READ/WRITABLE BY BOTH MAC AND PC?

I tried format FAT(DOS) using Disk Utility,App but it only made 1.4TB available of the 8TB drive

Your router must recognize the external SSD’s format, that’s all it takes. Different file systems on various computers don’t matter, they will access the SSD via a file sharing protocol, probably SMB.

 

[lsolesbee]

You’ll have to read the Netgear router manual to determine which file system formats the router recognizes with ext USB drives. Most likely NTFS for drive format while the router will share the drive over the network using SMB. All Windows and Macs can access SMB network file shares. But read the manual.

as i said... "Netgear only accepts FAT16, FAT32 NTFS XFS HFS HFS+ formats."

 

[iMacDragon]

SMB is not a drive format, it is how the router shares the drive it has mounted to the network and how the accessing computer sees it, and is not tied to the drive format in any way.

NTFS is probably the easist option if supported, as it can at least be read on either computer if later removed and directly connected too. Fat32 is indeed limited to hard max of 2TB, which will show as something smaller

 

[lsolesbee]

SMB is not a drive format, it is how the router shares the drive it has mounted to the network and how the accessing computer sees it, and is not tied to the drive format in any way.

NTFS is probably the easist option if supported, as it can at least be read on either computer if later removed and directly connected too. Fat32 is indeed limited to hard max of 2TB, which will show as something smaller

NTFS is not natively writable by Mac

 

[iMacDragon]

Yes, but it doesn't matter when it's plugged into router. And no format the router supports is writable by both that supports the full size - only ExFat is

 

[dmccloud]

The limitation in this scenario is your router. That being said, there are a couple of options that would let you read and write either an NTFS or HFS/HFS+ drive on both Windows and Mac. Paragon Software has HFS+ for Windows, as well as NTFS for Mac. I use the former option with a Windows PC I have set up as my media/Plex server in my house.