If you’ve run into issues with your hard drive, formatting is one of the first steps you should take to troubleshoot it. Formatting allows you to overwrite all the information on the hard drive, resetting the file structure and how the drive interacts with the operating system. It can also be used to prep a hard drive for use with another operating system.
Mar 31, 2020 Step 4: In the following pop-up window, enter a name, select MacOS Extended (Journalist) as the format, and GUID Partition Map as the scheme. Click the Erase button to make these changes. We would like to show you a description here but the site won’t allow us.
In this guide on how to format external hard drives, we’re going to help you make sure your portable disk works with everything. We’ll show you how to format your hard drive on Mac and Windows computer operating systems, and explain key settings on both operating systems. Enable bonjour mac.
Before getting to that, though, it’s important to understand what hard drive formatting is. Let’s first talk about hard drive formatting, file systems and how formatting doesn’t necessarily erase all data from your drive.
What Is Hard Drive Formatting?
Most people associate hard drive formatting with erasing a hard drive. Though that’s true to a degree, it’s not the sole purpose of the process. Instead, formatting is used to get the hard drive to a state in which it can be used by the computer, which requires all written data to be erased from the drive.
The data isn’t erased completely, but we’ll touch more on that later. Most external drives come ready to use on your computer, but in rare cases, you’ll need to format your drive. In fact, that’s one of our recommended troubleshooting steps in our how to solve an external hard drive not showing up guide.
With HFS+ for Windows by Paragon, you get read and write access for your new HFS+ formatted G-Technology drive in compatible Windows and macOS based computers without having to reformat the drive. By eliminating the hassle of multiple steps to transfer media files from one system to another, your creative workflow will be simpler and more. How to format a WD hard drive to exFAT or FAT32 file system Answer ID 291 A Western Digital external hard drive can be used on both Windows and Mac OSX. This is useful if a drive is being used under both Operating System (OS)to move files between the two environments. Most WD Drives come formatted in the NTFS (Windows) or HFS+ (Mac) format. Sep 06, 2019 Because the file system on the WD Passport For Mac external hard drive is a Mac OS Extended (Journaled) file system. This file system is also call HFS+. A Windows PC cannot see, read, write to that file system. To share that drive between a Mac and Windows PC you need software. Software that translates HFS+ into something the PC can understand.
Outside of formatting for initial use, you may need to reformat your hard drive if you encounter errors. In the same way a fresh install of your OS can solve most issues, reformatting your hard drive is a critical step in troubleshooting problems. Beforehand, just be sure your files are backed up with an online backup service, such as Backblaze(read our Backblaze review).
Before getting into the formatting process, though, it’s important to go over what you’ll be formatting the drive with: a file system.
File Systems
File systems are what operating systems use to store information on a storage device. Unfortunately, there isn’t a de facto file system that all hard drives use. The one yours uses largely depends on the drive and the computer OS you’re using. Because of that, we’re going to go over the most commonly used file system options so you’ll know what’s what.
We hope it’s clear now why understanding file systems is important. If you’ve checked out a sideloading guide, such as our Kodi sideloading guide, you probably saw recommendations to format to ExFAT or FAT32. That’s because those file systems work across platforms while NTFS and HFS Plus don’t.
Whichever file system your hard drive is shipped with, that’s what you have to use if you don’t want to remove all information from the drive. Alternatively, you could dump the files from your drive to a cloud storage service, such as Sync.com, format the drive and put your files back on it (read our Sync.com review, and check out our cloud storage providers comparison).
How to Format External Hard Drives
Now that we have formatting and file system basics out of the way, it’s time to show you how to format your external drive. We’ll show you how to do it on Windows and Mac operating systems using the Samsung T5, which is one of the best external hard drives, as you can see in our Samsung T5 review.
We chose the T5 because it’s formatted to ExFAT out of the box, meaning it works with a Mac or Windows computer straight away.
How to Format Your External Drive on Windows
Formatting a hard drive on Windows is a simple affair, especially if you leave everything as default. That said, if you want to change settings, you’ll need to know the details of each.
Before getting to those, you have to find the drive you want to format by following these steps.
Windows will then open the formatting wizard. We’re going to run through each setting in the wizard so you know which settings you need to change.
Though we went over the settings, the best thing to do is probably to leave them on their defaults. Once everything is set, all you need to do is click “start” and wait for the progress bar to fill.
How to Format Your External Drive on macOS
Formatting and dealing with hard drive-related matters, in general, is easy in macOS. Unlike Windows, macOS gives you the tools to format, partition, restore and repair your hard drive from a single screen that can be found in your utilities.
To find the screen, follow these steps.
After that, you’re done. macOS doesn’t give you as much control as Windows does, but as we explained, much of that control is irrelevant. The formatting process is simple, with Apple going as far as including step-by-step instruction above the options.
The only thing you may need to pay attention to is the security options. By default, macOS formats your drive the same way that a quick format does on Windows, meaning the file structure is erased, but the binary data is still there. You can fully erase everything by using the security options.
How to Fully Erase an External Hard Drive
As mentioned throughout this guide, formatting your external drive doesn’t erase all the information from it. Binary data needs to be written to the drive at all times, so instead of removing it, your OS deletes the file structure, meaning you can’t access the data on your drive.
For all intents and purposes, your information is erased. You can write new data to the drive, and your OS will show that all the space is available. If you’re disposing of a hard drive, though, someone can still access the data using a forensics tool. Essentially, those tools allow people to bypass the structure of the OS and piece together the files using the binary data.
As we said, the drive always needs to be filled with binary data. The only way to fully erase it is to overwrite what’s there with new binary data. Though the built-in utilities on Mac and Windows computer operating systems help, a hacker could reverse engineer the process to find the data on the drive.
There are few options to fully remove information. If you’re getting rid of the drive, a classic solution is to tap it a few times with a hammer to break the disks inside before recycling. If you need to remove data quickly and still want the drive to function, though, you’ll need a separate utility.
One of the most common is Darik’s Boot and Nuke. It’s an open-source project that rewrites the data on your drive using random processes to ensure it isn’t recoverable. You can boot to DBAN instead of your OS to start the process, which is ideal if you’re recycling or selling your computer.
Final Thoughts
We hope we’ve explained the differences between formatting and erasing an external drive. Formatting isn’t only used to get rid of data on a drive. It’s also used to make a drive compatible with a different OS. For example, The Western Digital My Book comes formatted to NTFS, but you can reformat it to ExFAT for use with macOS (read our Western Digital My Book review).
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If you’re looking to add to your external drive repertoire, read our external hard drive reviews. There, you’ll find our favorite portable disks, including the SanDisk Extreme Portable SSD (read our SanDisk Extreme Portable review).
Why do you need to format your drive? Do you have any more questions about the process? Let us know in the comments and, as always, thanks for reading.
Jun 08, 2020 • Filed to: Answer Hard Drive Problems • Proven solutions
External drives are portable hard drives which can be used for storing data which you want to keep on hand during your travels. Most of the external drives especially the WD ones available in the market are either formatted in NTFS or HFS+ format. The NTFS format is for Windows while HFS+ is for Macs. However, the new Macs are shipped with the latest Mac OS version, macOS High Sierra which supports the Apple File System or APFS. If your WD external drive isn’t in this new format, you won’t be able to use it if your Mac has been updated to macOS High Sierra. In such cases, you need to simply convert your WD external drive to APFS format.
Format Western Digital Hard Drive For MacHow to Convert External Drive to APFS format
If you want to format your external drive from its existing file format to the new Apple file format, APFS or Apple File System then you should follow these simple steps.
Video Tutorial on How to Format an External Hard DriveWhat is APFS?
APFS is the short form of Apple File System. It was introduced by Apple in the year 2006 and is now the default file system of the latest Mac operating system, macOS High Sierra. This new file system replaces the previous file system, Mac OS Extended or HFS+, which was used by all the Mac OS versions which came before it. It offers a number of advantages over its predecessors and is automatically applied to your hard drive upon the installation of macOS High Sierra. APFS has been optimized for SSDs and flash drives but can be used for external and hybrid drives as well. However, it is best suited for flash and solid state drives.
One thing to keep in mind about APFS is that it only works on macOS High Sierra. So, if you don’t have this Mac OS installed on your Mac, you won’t be able to open any drives using the APFS format.
Format Western Digital Hard Drive Hfs+ For Macos MacAdvantages of Converting to APFS
APFS offers a ton of benefits which you don’t find in HFS+. Moreover, it is also the recommended file system for SSDs and flash drives. The following are some of the advantages that you can avail by converting to APFS.
If you have bought a new WD external drive which isn’t formatted in the APFS format then you would have difficulty in opening it on a Mac running macOS High Sierra. Moreover, you won’t be able to enjoy the numerous benefits that this new file format has to offer you. In order to make sure that your WD external drive takes advantage of the APFS format, you need to convert it from HFS+ to APFS. You need to follow a simple set of procedures to ensure that your WD external drive is converted to the APFS format. These steps are easier to follow and the whole process wouldn’t take much time to complete.
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