Unable to access drives formatted in NTFS

[YoShLK]

I switched from Windows 10 to macOS about a week ago. Since I have several external drives formatted in NTFS that needs R/W access from "Big Sur" I installed "Mounty"

Later on, I decided to try iBoysoft NTFS, hoping it will be much reliable since it's available from the App Store. After installing it, however, I realized that it is not even detecting my NTFS, drives let alone granting R/W access to "Big Sur"

I uninstalled it and reverted to "Mounty" - Now, the problem is Mounty also fails to mount the NTFS formatted drives. I appreciate it if anybody can suggest a working solution.

 

[allan.nyholm]

try downloading Paragon NTFS - should have a trial of a couple of days - in any case I understand that you need write capability also. You can already read NTFS drives without software like iBoySoft or Mounty.

 

[bousozoku]

Paragon Software gets my money for Mac and Windows compatibility.

 

[casperes1996]

Another comment recommending Paragon. They are the premiere provider of NTFS support on Mac and HFS support on Windows.

However, another free solution, if drive space permits, is to copy the data off of the NTFS drives, re-format to ExFAT and copy the data back over. Now read-write is possible on Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS - anywhere basically

 

[posguy99]

I switched from Windows 10 to macOS about a week ago. Since I have several external drives formatted in NTFS that needs R/W access from "Big Sur" I installed "Mounty"

Later on, I decided to try iBoysoft NTFS, hoping it will be much reliable since it's available from the App Store. After installing it, however, I realized that it is not even detecting my NTFS, drives let alone granting R/W access to "Big Sur"

I uninstalled it and reverted to "Mounty" - Now, the problem is Mounty also fails to mount the NTFS formatted drives. I appreciate it if anybody can suggest a working solution.

All Mounty does is re-mount a drive read-write using the kernel NTFS driver. Now you see why Apple does not enable read-write support with that driver.

If you plug the drive back into a Windows machine, run CHKDSK on it and let it fix whatever it finds, does it work on the Mac again using the kernel driver?

 

[mikzn]

However, another free solution, if drive space permits, is to copy the data off of the NTFS drives, re-format to ExFAT and copy the data back over. Now read-write is possible on Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS - anywhere basically

I'll second @casperes1996 - ExFAT works great for both if you need to have a drive that works with WIndows and macOS - I have a couple drives shared to both windows and to macOS Mojave and Monterey -

I think there is a file size limit of 4g with ExFAT?

 

[allan.nyholm]

I'll second @casperes1996 - ExFAT works great for both if you need to have a drive that works with WIndows and macOS - I have a couple drives shared to both windows and to macOS Mojave and Monterey -

I think there is a file size limit of 4g with ExFAT?

I have not seen a 4 GB filesize limit using exFat - I've seen it with FAT32

 

[casperes1996]

I have not seen a 4 GB filesize limit using exFat - I've seen it with FAT32

Correct. Maximum file size for ExFAT is 16EiB (exbibytes).

A lot of cameras used to impose artificial recording limits however, either stopping recording or splitting up files after I believe it was 10 minutes - This was however due to higher tax on video cameras rather than any technical reason

 

[YoShLK]

I have not seen a 4 GB filesize limit using exFat - I've seen it with FAT32

Thank you very much. Paragon NTFS worked. I am looking forward to purchasing it.

 

[HDFan]

A lot of cameras used to impose artificial recording limits however, either stopping recording or splitting up files after I believe it was 10 minutes - This was however due to higher tax on video cameras rather than any technical reason

Correct. The limit is 30 minutes.