AirPort Extreme + ExFat Formatted Drive?

[Dominirey]

I formatted my External as ExFat because I will be using it across windows and mac and because it doesn't have a low max file size limit. Will I be able to connect it through my airport extreme to be a shared disk?

 

[Brian33]

I believe that that the external USB drive must be formatted either Mac OS Extended (Journaled), or FAT (not exFAT) to work with the Airport Extreme (or Time Capsule). I saw this on an Apple support page but I can't seem to find it right now.

Note that even if you format the drive as Mac OS Extended (Journaled), once it's plugged into your Airport Extreme even Windows machines on your network will be able to read/write to it. It's because the SMB network protocol is being used so the Windows machines never actually see the format of the drive. So, the only reason I can think of to format FAT or exFAT is if you are sometimes going to unplug it from the Airport and plug it into a Windows machine directly.

Regards,
Brian33

 

[Brian33]

Found the page I remembered, it's http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2426, and it says, in part:

The AirPort Extreme (802.11n) and Time Capsule support USB storage devices that are formatted as Mac OS Extended (HFS-plus), FAT16, or FAT32. Formatting a storage device as Mac OS Extended with journaling is recommended, as it may provide some more resilience if the device is removed or powered down while in use.

Note: ExFAT and NTFS formats aren't supported.

 

[Dominirey]

Thank you so much guys, I was hoping that I would be able to use ExFat because at home, I'd leave it plugged in to my AirPort so I could access on all my computers, but I also have to take it to other places, I guess I just won't be able to use it as a shared disk