Shared file system between Mac and PC?

[wakerider017]

Do you guys think we will ever have a shared file system between Mac and PC besides FAT32?

I would be fine with FAT except for that 4GB limitation.


I would be nice to have a file system compatible with both systems so I could carry around my external 2.5" drive and my thumb drive.

I use different PC's and Macs at school everyday so adding some sort of software is not an option.

 

[sickmacdoc]

I would hope so eventually for those that need it, but have not found the 4Gb file limit on individual files limitation with FAT32 a problem myself. The only place I have any individual files >4Gb are a handful of my video files but since they are used exclusively on my Macs it does not present a problem.

If I may ask, what types of files do you need to transport that are larger than 4Gb each? You have my curiosity up.

 

[wakerider017]

I would hope so eventually for those that need it, but have not found the 4Gb file limit on individual files limitation with FAT32 a problem myself. The only place I have any individual files >4Gb are a handful of my video files but since they are used exclusively on my Macs it does not present a problem.

If I may ask, what types of files do you need to transport that are larger than 4Gb each? You have my curiosity up.

Mostly disk image files like .iso and .dmg (For instance I bought iLife 09' and wanted to make a digital backup in case the DVD got scratched.. Unfortunately the resulting .dmg file is to large to put on my FAT external drive that I use for both Mac and PC.)

It is not a frequent problem, but when you run into a situation like this you are sorta stuck. If possible I will resort to transferring over the network, but that option is not always available. (In the case of iLife I was just trying to back it up to an external drive to keep it safe and not take up room on my main drive. For this I would need a NTFS or Mac formatted drive.)

A universal format would make life much easier!

For those running Bootcamp on your mac:
Just imagine you could also write to NTFS from Mac, and it would be so nice to even see let alone write to a Mac formatted drive from NTFS

 

[Chase R]

I'm not really familiar with a ZFS formatted drive but Snow Leopard is suppose to read and write to ZFS drives. Windows can read and write to ZFS as well right? That could be a possible solution... Just have to wait a few months.

 

[DARKJ3DI]

I'm not really familiar with a ZFS formatted drive but Snow Leopard is suppose to read and write to ZFS drives. Windows can read and write to ZFS as well right? That could be a possible solution... Just have to wait a few months.

Its called ZFS and its used on OpenSolaris

 

[Chase R]

Its called ZFS and its used on OpenSolaris

Ya I fixed it... I don't know why I wrote ZIF lol. Can Windows read/write to ZFS ?

 

[Tex-Twil]

Hi,
I have a external hard disk and it is formatted in NTFS cos I formally had only PC at home. Since two months I have only mac at home ( ) but I kept my external HD in NTFS. I use NTFS 3g to have a write access to the disk from OSX.

It is not that fast as native ntfs write support but it works quite fine.

Tex

 

[nplima]

Linux EXT2/3.

http://sourceforge.net/projects/ext2fsx/
http://www.fs-driver.org/

 

[DoFoT9]

Ya I fixed it... I don't know why I wrote ZIF lol. Can Windows read/write to ZFS ?

no it cannot. besides, ZFS is for Snow Leopard server only, and it currently only allows read only access (AFAIK).

Hi,
I have a external hard disk and it is formatted in NTFS cos I formally had only PC at home. Since two months I have only mac at home ( ) but I kept my external HD in NTFS. I use NTFS 3g to have a write access to the disk from OSX.

It is not that fast as native ntfs write support but it works quite fine.

Tex

that would seem the best & easiest option.