Windows -> Mac flash question

[stickshifty]

Hello, I have a quick question about using a Windows-formatted flash drive in my Mac.

My friend let me borrow his flash drive so I can save some pictures for my sister and then have them printed out at a local store (we're at college and our printers are just good enough for printing papers and she needs decent-quality pictures for her sorority). So before he gives it to me, he tells me to make sure that my Mac doesn't format his flash so he doesn't lose everything on it, but he had to go to class and didn't tell me how to prevent that.

Help please? I don't want him to lose his stuff, and the bookstore is closed so I can't buy a new one.

 

[MacDawg]

You should be fine
I use mine on both computers all of the time

Your Mac won't automatically reformat anything

Woof, Woof - Dawg

 

[DeusInvictus7]

yeah if youre just transferring photos youre fine, it wont reformat...

 

[stickshifty]

Thanks for the replies. I successfully put the jpeg-ness on without losing all his files!

 

[SnowLeopard2008]

flash drives have a special format, just don't bust out disk utility and just drag/drop. although, OS X will leave a few fragment folders, like spotlight on the drive, but it's readable on windows, so ur friend will be able to delete them if he wants to, they're usually empty folders..

 

[richard.mac]

flash drives have a special format, just don't bust out disk utility and just drag/drop. although, OS X will leave a few fragment folders, like spotlight on the drive, but it's readable on windows, so ur friend will be able to delete them if he wants to, they're usually empty folders..

flash drives under 4 GB are formatted as FAT32. its not a 'special' format its just an old file system introduced in 1996 and is cross platform.