Coming from Windows - Hard Drive Question

[aboyes]

Can anyone help please? I'm trying to get my dad to get a mac mini but the problem I have is that he's coming from Windows XP.

Anyway he has a Seagate HDD that I assume is formatted to NTFS and I dont know what to do about his files on the drive as I think that the drive wont show on a mac without being FAT32.

What are my options?

Can I network the PC to the MAC and transfer files back across if I format the HDD to fat 32? OR can I with a driver make the NTFS drive show and be able to read/write to it?

Thanks

 

[gr8tfly]

OS X has native read-only NTFS support, so all you'll need is a way to connect the drive (an external enclosure, or just a bare-drive SATA to USB cable).

The setup Migration Assistant during in OS X can migrate all the files from your PC, either over a shared network drive, or a direct connection to the drive itself. See: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2518

 

[drsox]

Windows XP to OSX : http://macs.about.com/od/macwindows/ss/filesharexpmac.htm

 

[yliu]

Never had problems moving drives from windows to Mac. Problems arise when you go the other direction.