External Hard Drive For Mac To PC?

[Rob587]

Im trying to get all of my itunes and files onto my PC from my mac. Would the best way to do this be through an external hard drive? Will the external hd be cross compatible? I can't do it with an iPod becuase it's formatted differently right?

 

[spinnerlys]

You could try exPod to get your music off the iPod first. If that does not work, you could use a network connection, LAN or Wireless LAN. If that does not work, you could use an external HDD formatted for Windows (NTFS), as Mac OS X can at least read that. After that you can reformat the HDD for your uses, HFS+ (Mac OS Extended) for using it with Mac OS X only, FAT32 for using it with Windows and Mac OS X, but the maximum file size is limited to 4GB.

You can also use MRoogle to find dozens of similar threads.

 

[Rob587]

You could try exPod to get your music off the iPod first. If that does not work, you could use a network connection, LAN or Wireless LAN. If that does not work, you could use an external HDD formatted for Windows (NTFS), as Mac OS X can at least read that. After that you can reformat the HDD for your uses, HFS+ (Mac OS Extended) for using it with Mac OS X only, FAT32 for using it with Windows and Mac OS X, but the maximum file size is limited to 4GB.

You can also use MRoogle to find dozens of similar threads.

so with the external hd formated to NTFS, I could just drag and drop everything from my mac and then on to my pc? The individual file size limit is 4GB or the entire transfer is limited to 4GB?

 

[spinnerlys]

so with the external hd formated to NTFS, I could just drag and drop everything from my mac and then on to my pc? The individual file size limit is 4GB or the entire transfer is limited to 4GB?

Sorry, understood it the other way around, that you come from Windows and want to go to Mac OS X.

NTFS can only be read natively via Mac OS X (see 3rd link I provided), FAT32 can be written and read by both OSs. The limit is for one file, not for one transfer.

 

[Rob587]

Sorry, understood it the other way around, that you come from Windows and want to go to Mac OS X.

NTFS can only be read natively via Mac OS X (see 3rd link I provided), FAT32 can be written and read by both OSs. The limit is for one file, not for one transfer.

So right out of the box, plug the hd into my mac, then somehow set it up for FAT32, then drag and drop files, then plug it into my pc? How do I set the hd to FAT32?

 

[GGJstudios]

FAT32

• Read/Write FAT32 from both native Windows and native Mac OS X.
• No individual file larger than 4GB.

NTFS

• Read/Write NTFS from native Windows.
• Read only NTFS from native Mac OS X
• To Read/Write NTFS from Leopard: Install MacFUSE and NTFS-3G. You can install both with NTFS-3G for Mac OS X.
• To Read/Write NTFS from Snow Leopard: Guide: Enable native NTFS Read/Write in Snow Leopard
• (Be aware that some are of the opinion that enabling native NTFS in SL is unstable/unreliable, and favor the MacFuse/NTFS-3G method for Snow Leopard)

HFS

• Read/Write HFS from native Mac OS X
• To Read/Write HFS from Windows, Install MacDrive
• To Read HFS (but not Write) from Windows, Install HFSExplorer

 

[Rob587]

How do I make sure that the hd is formatted to FAT32?

 

[GGJstudios]

How do I make sure that the hd is formatted to FAT32?

Disk Utility, which is in your Applications folder, possibly in a Utilities sub-folder.

If you right-click on any drive on your Desktop, then Get Info, it will tell you the format.