Can I transfer my Windows stuff easily?

[bluewomble88]

Hi

I've just ordered a MacBook Pro with a WD Ultra external HD. I already have a Windows Vista machine with a run-of-the-mill external hard drive. On it I have MP3s, photos, and some important Word and Excel files. I want to transfer everything off it to my new WD Ultra for use on my MacBook Pro. I will never use the Windows machine again.

Is it as simple as copying the files from one hard drive to another and carrying on as if nothing had happened?

Many thanks.

 

[simon48]

Pretty much, any HD format to FAT can be used by Macs and PCs.

 

[SarcasticJoe]

I don't see why it shouldn't be that simple... Only exception might be that you might have to ether install some drivers that allow you to write to NTFS* or reformat it if the drive uses that format. If it's FAT32, then you don't need to do anything.

NTFS is Microsoft's own closed file system that other OS's only support because of reverse engineering (which is always risky business due to the threat of lawsuits). Because of this most Linux distributions don't have NFTS drivers by default and OSX has ones that can only read (but not write) to NFTS by default.