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HD for BackUP - PC User, soon to be Mac User

B

Basti.13

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Mar 18, 2009
14
0
Moin Moin,

I am thinking about getting a single USB HD to replace my 3 small external ones and have a little more capacity.
I am currently still using a Windows PC but will get a Macbook as soon as Apple updates them.
I want to use the HD with TimeMaschine once I got the Mac. Until then I need it to backup a whole lot of files (prolly nothing larger than 4 gigs for now).

So my questions are:

1. Can I just buy any USB HD and it will work with Time Maschine?
2. Option A: Can I format it in NTFS in order to connect it to my PC (and to friends PCs as well) and then install something on my Mac later on so that the Mac can read from NTFS? If so, what would I have to install and does it work with Time Maschine? I want to use the disk as well to copy most of my data from my PC to my Mac once I have it.
3. Option B: Is FAT32 a lot slower than NTFS or the Mac system? As I said, right now I don't really need to copy files larger than 4 gigs, but you never know what will come up, so I think I rather don't want to do this.

I think that's it for the moment.
Thanks a lot.
Basti.
 
Basti.13 said:
So my questions are:

1. Can I just buy any USB HD and it will work with Time Maschine?
2. Option A: Can I format it in NTFS in order to connect it to my PC (and to friends PCs as well) and then install something on my Mac later on so that the Mac can read from NTFS? If so, what would I have to install and does it work with Time Maschine? I want to use the disk as well to copy most of my data from my PC to my Mac once I have it.
3. Option B: Is FAT32 a lot slower than NTFS or the Mac system? As I said, right now I don't really need to copy files larger than 4 gigs, but you never know what will come up, so I think I rather don't want to do this.

I think that's it for the moment.
Thanks a lot.
Basti.
Click to expand...

Answers:

1 - yes, but it must be formatted as HFS+ (Mac Os Extended (journaled)), and should use GUID partition table. Some drives come pre-formatted for Mac. I just purchased the Seagate Freeagent Desktop for Mac, which has both USB2 and FW800 (2nd only to eSata in performance and more versatile) - $139 for 1TB, pre-formatted per above. That's a great price for a FW800 external. I've put together a few with separate cases and drives, and I can't beat that price right now. Also, it looks cool... :cool:

2 - Yes & No.
The partition the Time Machine resides on must be formatted in HFS+ (Mac OS Extended (journaled) - also, you should use the GUID partition map, which is required if you ever want to make a bootable partition (very desirable) .

Mac OS-X can natively read NTFS, but not write; it can also r/w FAT32 natively, as well.
​

3 - If you're just interested in file sharing, FAT32 should work fine (within the 4GB file size limitation).

And: Welcome to Macintosh! :apple: :)
 
Basti.13 said:
Thanks a lot for your answers. One more thing:


Does that work with Time Maschine as well?
Click to expand...

The Time Machine partition still needs to be HFS+ (if that's what you were asking). TM uses special files which aren't supported in the other formats.
 
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