#Format A Windows Drive Full Of Content

Right-click the USB drive you intend to format and choose 'Format'. Download and launch EaseUS partition software. Connect the USB drive or pen drive to your computer.

exFAT вЂ“ Extensible File Allocation TableWith so many options for how you can format a new hard drive, how do you know which option is the right one for you? And moreover, will it even be compatible with your computer?So letвЂ™s break down each format one by one.Released in March of 2017, APFS was first used on macOS Sierra. HFS вЂ“ Hierarchical File System, otherwise known as MacOS Or delete files stored on Windows NTFS-formatted USB drives on your Mac.

It is not an ideal choice for your external hard drive, which for many users will be a regular spinning hard drive and not an expensive large solid-state volume.You may be familiar with this option as it is the default option that appears when you go to format a hard drive on your Mac. Unlike other formats, which require you to wait to basically copy the file a second time, APFS just magically duplicates it right in front of you in a split second.While this all sounds great, remember that APFS was designed for your internal solid-state computer hard drive and your iOS device. For those of us on laptops with smaller SSDs, this is a huge benefit to using APFS.Another great thing about APFS is that it will duplicate your files, even the very large ones, instantaneously. That means if I have a large video file and I duplicate it on my computer, the duplicate doesnвЂ™t take up more storage on my computer. Most modern Mac computers, from your basic MacBook and MacBook Pro to your iMac, iMac Pro, and Mac MiniвЂ™s, all have SSDs in them now.One of the great things that APFS does that you will really notice is that it essentially shares data from one file to another. While divisive at first, APFS has proven itself to be a powerful drive format for Mac users for a variety of reasons.First, APFS was designed with flash storage Solid-State Drives (SSDs) in mind.

This, of course, isnвЂ™t helpful if you are a video professional working with files in the tens or hundreds of gigabytes.ExFAT solves a lot of those problems by removing the file size and volume size limitations but keeping the great cross-platform sharing options available. You may have heard вЂњoh but exFAT has limitationsвЂќ and that was once true of FAT32, but is no longer true of exFAT.In FAT32, no single file could be any larger than 4GB, and no drive volume could be larger than 8TB. In fact, I have a client who works exclusively on PC, and I work exclusively on Mac, and we format all of our shared drives as exFAT so we can work collaboratively if needed.ExFAT is a newer option that replaces the old FAT32 option. It works on both Mac and PC and can share files back and forth. I canвЂ™t add a new folder, or drop more cute puppy pictures on this hard drive.If you do want to share content between your Windows PC and your Mac, there is a solution for that though.ExFAT is an interesting option for users.

Here are some guidelines to follow: Depending on how a Windows user creates the exFAT volume, IвЂ™ve found that Mac users can run into this issue, so I always make it a rule of thumb when using exFAT to create the exFAT volume on my Mac first before it gets used on a PC.Well, the answer is complicated because it depends on your scenario. On most occasions, I received this dreaded screen:Yikes again! So I had to use a blank hard drive I had here, format it as exFAT using my Mac, and then plug both drives into my Windows PC that I have here to copy the contents from one to the other.I was then able to format the drive on my Mac and copy the contents back onto it. I work with a client who exclusively uses a Windows PC, and he creates an exFAT hard drive for me, loads it up with footage, and sends it to me. Knowing that, itвЂ™s important to always keep backups of your files in multiple places, especially if you are using exFAT.Another important warning comes from a personal experience using exFAT.

Format A Windows Drive Full Of Content

If you are a Mac user and have been given a Windows hard drive full of content but you donвЂ™t have a Windows computer handyвЂ¦ well I said weвЂ™d be talking about this and fortunately the solution is very simple.How to open a hard drive from Mac or Windows on either computerThere are three great tools in case you ever do need to access and interact with the content on an external hard drive that has not been formatted for your computer. If you are a Mac user and need to share this drive with a Windows user вЂ“ exFAT If you are a Windows users sharing this drive with other Windows users вЂ“ NTFS

Format A Windows Drive For Mac