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Resolved Question

Best format for external HD

May 19, 2012 10:47PM PDT

I found several similar queries, but none of them recent, or would answer #2 below ...

I have a 1.5Tb NTFS-formatted drive that I want to use with my MBA (OS X 10.7.4). I have also installed MacFUSE on the MBA. I'm not familiar with using MacFUSE, only that it's supposed to accommodate NTFS. As a data drive for the MBA, I ask what is the best format to use? I will not be used for a PC (ie, Windows) ... but I'd hate to eliminate the possibility. 2 questions

(1) I suppose the dark horse is the ExFAT format -- what are its advantages & disadvantages?

(2) If I felt I wanted to partiton the drive and/or reformat it, how do I use MacFUSE to format a partition as NTFS?

TIA & Cheerios from the Avalon Peninsula!

Discussion is locked

rare_wolf has chosen the best answer to their question. View answer
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Clarification Request
Clarification
May 19, 2012 10:55PM PDT

I should clarify ... it is "FUSE for OS X" that is installed ... not MacFUSE

Best Answer

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Only one answer to this question.
May 19, 2012 11:37PM PDT

Even though you keep moving the goalposts during your question.

Mac OS X Extended (journaled) is the format of choice for a drive that will not be used on windows.

You do not need Fuse for OS X to do anything on that drive, the Apple Disk Utility will format the drive for you.

Should you want to share the drive with a PC, then you can install HFS for Windows on the PC.

If you want to create a partition and format it as NTFS, you could do that by connecting the drive to the Mac and creating a FAT partition and then attach it to a PC and reformat that partition as NTFS.
Remember that a Windows machine cannot read or write a disk that is formatted Mac OS X Extended(journaled), without third party software but a Mac can read, but cannot write, to a disk formatted as NTFS.

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Thanx Mrmacfixit
May 20, 2012 12:29AM PDT

I was about to move the goal posts yet again with the facts that I use Windows XP virtually, and my acrchive solution will only write to HFS+ partitions ... but "HFS for Windows" should remedy everything!

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Using XP virtually would not present a problem with
May 20, 2012 5:57AM PDT

reading and writing.
You wouldn't even need HFS for Windows in that case as most VM solutions, Parallels for instance, all for the moving of data files from one environment to the other without a problem.

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HFS & virtual XP
May 20, 2012 10:37PM PDT

Hmmmm(?) ... I use VMware's Fusion ... and I switched USB access for a HFS+ formatted USB external drive over to XP, and it never showed up on the drive list. I assumed it was because of the format(?)

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I use Paralells with XP
May 21, 2012 3:30AM PDT

and all my Mac formatted disks appear under My Computer

However, I was not referring to external drives when I made my comment.
I was talking about the ability to drag windows files onto the Mac desktop, and vice versa

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