Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Which USB flash drives are compatible with 10.5 leopard
- Thread starter Power Pc Mac
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
I've never had a problem with any USB 2 flash drives that I've tried.
Never gave any thought to what name they were sold as and they have always worked, at least for me.
Never gave any thought to what name they were sold as and they have always worked, at least for me.
The way they were formatted at the factory used to be a small issue. Most of them (if not all) are formatted for Windows PCs. Back on Jaguar and Panther I had some issues where I couldn't copy anything to a flash drive because it was formatted that way.
Bringing it in to Disk Utility and repartitioning it as APM fixed it.
Now it's pretty much irrelevant how it's formatted.
Bringing it in to Disk Utility and repartitioning it as APM fixed it.
Now it's pretty much irrelevant how it's formatted.
I buy $9 USB 3 Kingstons all the time from the IT store at my work, and have zero issues with them using anything all the way back to OS 8.6.
As said, formatting(or intializing, depending on the OS you're using) is sometimes required, but even something in FAT32 or EXFAT will be readable in Leopard. I think the only thing you'll run into issues with is NTSF.
As said, formatting(or intializing, depending on the OS you're using) is sometimes required, but even something in FAT32 or EXFAT will be readable in Leopard. I think the only thing you'll run into issues with is NTSF.
Was just about to say "You need compatible USBs for Leopard?"
I use Kingston,Lexar,PNY,etc never had an issue.
I use Kingston,Lexar,PNY,etc never had an issue.
Agree with all of the above. I've gotten USB2 drives to work fine in 8.6 as long as they were HFS. Leopard I believe is the first OS X version that supported ExFAT, but it's what I normally partition big flash drives as for best interoperability options.
I just tried a exFat drive on my Leopard PPC, it doesn't work. I thought SL introduced exFat.
yes, correct, support was officially added in Snow Leopard.
When I looked at wikipedia about ExFat, that page says that ExFat on OS X is supported by OS X 10.6.5 and later.
https://www.macrumors.com/2010/11/1...rt-airprint-flash-player-vulnerability-fixes/
So, not supported in Leopard. Seems that some say it does work in Leopard, maybe that is just read-only.
Even HFS+ will work fine in 8.6. The key-I've found-is to initialize the drive in 8.6(or OS 9.x). It took me a while to get this workflow down as-for various reasons-I've often found myself needing to transfer files between older and newer Macs.
Although 8.6 is required for a USB mass storage device, OS 8 or 8.1(I don't remember which) introduced HFS+ and it's handy to be able to use something like a Zip disk in those situations. Apple dropped the ability to write to HFS(standard) in 10.6, so otherwise you need a "bridge" computer to get between the two.
Just something to keep in mind if transfering files from OS X to OS 9 (or earlier)…
OS9 has a 255 character limit for filenames. However, certain APPS that run in OS9 retain the older 32 character filename limit - including…Finder! OS8 and earlier have a 32 character filename limit all the way around.
So, if you have long filenames in OS X or Windows (past 32 characters) be sure to trim the name before copying to OS9 or earlier.
@bunnspecial This is one of the reasons I had to stop using the PM6500 as a Time Machine backup drive (USB attached drives) for my OS X Macs. Many, many, many files were failing to backup because the filenames were too long.
This is also another reason that Services for Macintosh on Windows Servers 2003 and earlier suck royally! They use an older implementation of AFP that only allows 32 character filename limits.
OS9 has a 255 character limit for filenames. However, certain APPS that run in OS9 retain the older 32 character filename limit - including…Finder! OS8 and earlier have a 32 character filename limit all the way around.
So, if you have long filenames in OS X or Windows (past 32 characters) be sure to trim the name before copying to OS9 or earlier.
@bunnspecial This is one of the reasons I had to stop using the PM6500 as a Time Machine backup drive (USB attached drives) for my OS X Macs. Many, many, many files were failing to backup because the filenames were too long.
This is also another reason that Services for Macintosh on Windows Servers 2003 and earlier suck royally! They use an older implementation of AFP that only allows 32 character filename limits.
Used tons of USB drives on my G4 and G3 machines. From 4 to 64 gigabytes, no worries. Also tried an Sharkoon 3.5" + 2.5" HDD enclosure, once again, works just fine. USB drives and enclosures just are made to be plug and play on about anything that has a port.
There is some compatibility issues with USB 1.x-2.0 machines depending upon the flash drive controller chipset, AData has a tech note about certain USB 2.0 models needing a "driver/enabler" for Win9x-ME+NT4/OS 8.x and Lexar S25(USB 3.0) has compatibility problems on USB 1.x/VIA USB 2.0 chipsets & they won't support anything lower than OS 10.1/WinXP--only found that USB 2.0 chipset incompatibility after it refused to work on my first gen Athlon 64. Other Lexar USB 2.0 flash drives seem more "friendly" on USB 1.1/VIA USB 2.0 based systems.
Beyond those two makers, SanDisk, Patriot, PNY & Kingston hasn't changed their controller chipset supplier(s). If you don't care about raw speed and prefer compatibility with OS 8.x/9x I'd recommend PNY & Kingston.
SanDisk at one point sold non-USB compliant flash drives optimized for Win8/8.1 features/Win2Go, instead of being seen as "removable" it was a "fixed drive" embedded to the firmware which made them non-bootable(Linux/USB OS X installers)/problematic on older OSes or PC OEM OS restore tools--I have three of these useless Cruzer/Cruzer Glide models, they frequently get stuck in a non-eject/unmount loop on WinXP/Vista/7/OS X Snow Leopard(and earlier) and you need to shutdown to safely remove. SanDisk took nearly 8 months to move back to their old "removable" storage firmware but stores still had "new old stock" until late 2013, SKU never changed which made identifying old(Win8/8.1) vs new impossible until you opened & plugged it in then worry about a return policy headache at stores.
Beyond those two makers, SanDisk, Patriot, PNY & Kingston hasn't changed their controller chipset supplier(s). If you don't care about raw speed and prefer compatibility with OS 8.x/9x I'd recommend PNY & Kingston.
SanDisk at one point sold non-USB compliant flash drives optimized for Win8/8.1 features/Win2Go, instead of being seen as "removable" it was a "fixed drive" embedded to the firmware which made them non-bootable(Linux/USB OS X installers)/problematic on older OSes or PC OEM OS restore tools--I have three of these useless Cruzer/Cruzer Glide models, they frequently get stuck in a non-eject/unmount loop on WinXP/Vista/7/OS X Snow Leopard(and earlier) and you need to shutdown to safely remove. SanDisk took nearly 8 months to move back to their old "removable" storage firmware but stores still had "new old stock" until late 2013, SKU never changed which made identifying old(Win8/8.1) vs new impossible until you opened & plugged it in then worry about a return policy headache at stores.