External Hard Drive (PC Formatted with Media) to MAC

S

smiles906

Active member
Hey Guys,

I didn't know where to put this, so if its not in the right location I apologize.

Well, I have been working with a PC (Windows Vista) for a while and just got a MacBook Pro. With the PC I had 2 Western Digital Hard Drives. 1 was 320GB, and the second was 500GB.

The 320GB is full and the 500GB only has 100 or less used. How do I go about using those external hard drives with my Mac? I want to open them and use them and not it be read only.

I also got a 1TB WD HD that is new and maybe will help if I transfer footage.

So.. How do I go about using the 2 HD without losing anything and using it to my normal acitivies.

Your help is greatly appreciated!!
 
well i can read and write to windows formatted HDs? So I'm not really sure what is wrong here. I format all my hard drives to Mac format because i feel its more reliable.
 
do you want to use them on windows again or just make the Mac exclusive. What i would do is format the 1TB drive, then move all the contents from the other 2 over to it, reformat them for mac, then you can move what you want back from the 1TB drive to the 2 other externals.
 
Thanks guys for the reply. No, I would not want to use it in Windows again. Once I switch it I will only use in on Mac.

Will I format the 1TB in Mac or PC?
 
Alright. I just connected the PC formated HD to the Mac. And it read it. I click get more info and when I click sharing, it said you can read and write. I copied a file to the desktop and all is good. So is it fine?

The file system is MS-DOS (FAT 32).

But: for the HDV files I click it to view on Quicktime and they only have sound and the video is just black? the Video files that are HDV are avi. But so are the non-hdv files that are avi and they play.
 
hey guys. Thanks for the reply.
Well I just got a brand new HD exernal western digital and when I installed it was FAT 32.

The qustion I had now was the hdv files will openin quicktime but only sound and the video is blacked out. It says when I open it, a quicktime component is missing and it takes me to a site where I can download like Dixvi and etc.. What do I need to install?
 
Barry_Green said:
But ONLY if you don't want to take that drive back to a Windows system.

If you use FAT32 the drive can be equally read/written on both operating systems.
Click to expand...

oh i know, thats why i asked if he was going to be ever going back to windows again, which he said he wouldnt, i think would be better in the long run to just do HFS+

why wont HDV play though? theres something up
 
Will it be faster to run with HFS than NTFS? I have a program from Paragon to run NTFS on my MBP but is it better to format my HD for mac only with HFS over NTFS. Please let me know!
 
1. HDV video won't play - probably a codec missing.

2. and every new external USB drive I've purchased lately comes FAT32 (i.e.max 4GB file size), so I just leave it like that to swap between my XP laptop (filed unit) and Mac Pro.
 
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