External Hard drive Formatting & Compatibility

What is a file system?

A file system dictates the way information is written and read from a hard drive. Think of a file system like a language (or character set). Information stored inside a book written with Hebrew characters cannot be retrieved by a person that only reads Roman characters.

How-to FORMAT an external drive for MAC/PC Compatibility

ECUAD Techs recommend you format your external drive as 'exFAT' using a PC. A hard drive formatted to exFAT with a Mac may not work with Windows.
Formatting your drive will ERASE ALL DATA PERMANENTLY. Backup and save all important data on a different drive

PC

• Is the external drive visible in Explorer?
  • Yes
    • Right Click > select "Format"
    • Name Drive
    • Choose "exFAT" under "file system"
    • "Quick Format" is checked ON
    • Hit OK
  • NO
    • Speak to an animation technician! animtech@ecuad.ca

MAC

Alternatively, if you are using a MAC - you can format your external drive as "fat32".
This has some limitations, however. Files are limited to 4GB max.

• Open System Preferences
• Open "Disk Manager"
• On the left find the drive you wish to format
• Double-check you have the correct drive!
  • Check drive name
  • Check drive size
• Find the tab labelled "erase"
• Choose your file system (fat32)
• Name your volume
• Hit erase!
• [OSX formatting Guide]
  

Common File Systems

HFS+

Read/Write on MAC

Cannot read/write on PC without special software

• • read/write on PC /w MacDrive - $50
  • read on PC /w HFSExplorer - free
  • read/write on PC /w Paragon HFS+ - $20

NTFS

Read/Write on PC (Windows 10/8/Vista/Xp)

Read on MAC - Cannot Write

• • 256TB max volume size
  • 16TB max file size

• • Can be written to on PC with this workaround:[Enable NTFS read/write on mac with terminal]

exFAT (RECOMMENDED)

Read/Write on both Mac and PC

• exFAT drive MUST be formatted on a PC
• Drive formatted on exFAT on MAC will not read on PC
• 128,000TB Max Volume size
• 128,000TB max file size

FAT32

Read/Write on both Mac and PC

• Old file system used by Windows
• 4TB max volume size
• 4GB max file size