formatting external hardrive for mac and windows

Formatting External Hardrive And Windows Software That Can
Formatting External Hardrive And Windows Portable Media To

Luckily you can format your drive so it does just this, I shall be showing you how in this article.

In this utility, click the dropdown menu for File system and select ExFAT, this is a drive format that is compatible with both macOS and Windows for reading and writing data, for more information on ExFAT take a look at these resources.

To use Spotlight either click the magnifying glass icon ( ) found on the top right corner of your display or open it by pressing Space.

Disk Utility separates these into different sections on the sidebar under the Internal and External headings.

Your external drive should be listed under the external section.

Once you have found your drive in the list double check it is the correct one and ensure that you have selected the drive and not the partition for the drive.

Click the Erase button and then give your external drive a name, set the format to ExFAT and the scheme to GUID Partition Map and then click erase, this will permanently delete all the information and files on the external drive so ensure you have copied all your data off the drive before erasing you are responsible for the data on your device so make sure it is in a safe place.

You are responsible for the data on your device and ensuring it is backed up before proceeding with instructions in this article.

When the Disk Utility opens, choose the Western Digital hard drive icon from the sidebar.

In this blog post, we will walk you through the formatting process and share instructions to format an external drive on macOS Windows.

But before you proceed, understand that formatting carries a risk of hard drive corruption and data loss.

Formatting External Hardrive And Windows Software That Can

So, in case, if you had accidentally lost your data due to drive formatting or corruption, we also recommend a data recovery software that can rescue data from your HDD.

Usually, their arsenal includes a cutting-edge Windows 10 desktop, the latest and the magnificent MacBook Pro, DSLR SD-Cards of-course and the trusted loved external drives such as the WD My Passport.

Formatting External Hardrive And Windows Portable Media To

The role of the WD My Passport drive is crucial since the individual will leverage the portable media to safely store their collection of pictures, videos, audio, and docs.

But despite the best of the best device specifications; there remains one small glitch to rectify.

We know, Macs and Windows have their native file systems such as the new APFS or HFS and the NTFS.

A WD My Passport formatted with Mac file system will be a dud on the Windows and vice-versa.

Thankfully, MS-DOS FAT32 and ex-FAT formats have survived to date, and these are the file system to make your WD My Passport work with a Mac and a Windows PC simultaneously.

In the next 5 minutes read, you will master yourself in formatting a WD My Passport safely and in a manner best suited for sharing your digital files between a macOS and Windows OS.

To format a Western Digital My Passport external hard drive in ex-FAT or FAT32 format, you can bank on built-in applications of Mac PC.

However, while doing this, there are things you have to keep in mind and follow the correct steps.

Here you will get to know about the process to format your My passport portable drive in FAT32 and ex-FAT file system in both Windows and Mac platforms.

In Windows Platform: 1.

Connect your Western Digital My Passport hard drive to your Windows PC through the USB cable.

Wait till the Windows detects the external hard drive and configure it as an expansion drive automatically.

Now, click the Start button and select This PC.

A new Windows Explorer window opens, on the left side of the screen; you will see a list of installed drives and their drive letters.

Locate the icon assigned to Western Digital My Passport drive and Right-click the connected drive icon and click Format in the pop-up menu.

Select the File System from the drop-down list, which is available in the format expansion and choose either ex-FAT or FAT32.

Enter a relevant name in the Volume Label field.

This name will represent your drive when you connect it with Windows Explorer or Mac and will be mentioned above the drive letter for the My Passport drive.

Therefore, enter a descriptive name.

Now, again select a Quick Format option, then click Start option, wait for a few minutes to get your drive reformatted with the FAT32 file system, so that you can use it.

After successful formatting, you can directly save or move files to it like any other external hard drive.

In macOS OS X Platform Connect your Western Digital My Passport drive to Mac computer, and let the OS detect and mount the drive for use.

When the Finder window opens, on the menu bar, select Go and then Utilities.

After that, you will be able to see ApplicationsUtilities folder in Finder.

From the Utilities folder window, select Disk Utility application.

Formatting External Hardrive For Mac And Windows