How To Clean External Hard Drive On Mac

Virtually external difficult drives are designed to work for Windows computers. So if you're trying to connect an external hard drive to a Mac, you might have to format the drive before yous can use it. Hither'southward how to do that:

How to Format a Hard Drive for Mac

Note: If y'all already used your external difficult drive on a PC, be sure to back upwardly any files on it. Formatting your drive will wipe out all the data in it.

Connect an external hard drive to your Mac. Some external hard drives need to be plugged into an outlet to piece of work.
Go to Spotlight Search, type in Disk Utility, and click the first option. This will open the Disk Utility app, where you volition observe all the internal and external drives that are continued to your Mac.
Then click View in the top-left corner of the window and select Bear witness All Devices.
Click the external difficult bulldoze you desire to format. You can find this on the left-hand side of the screen under External Hard Drives. For the all-time issue, select the disk (the highest selection in the external tree).
On the top bill of fare, click Erase. This volition open a pocket-size pop-upwardly window with a warning that erasing the drive will delete all data stored on information technology and that it can't be undone.
Choose a name, format, and scheme for your drive. Y'all can choose whatever name you want, and you should cull GUID Partition Map for the Scheme in most cases. Withal, you can choose between the following formats:
- Mac Bone Extended (Journaled) is the best option for near Mac users since it is compatible with all Macs.
- APFS (Apple File System) is only for newer Macs running macOS ten.thirteen or subsequently.
- exFAT is compatible with both PC and Mac.
- MS-DOS (Fat) is too compatible with Mac and PC, only you can just transfer files smaller than 4GB.
When you're done with providing the setup details, click Erase. This will immediately wipe the entire bulldoze.

If you get an error message that states, "Erase process has failed. Click done to proceed," don't freak out most it. This is an effect caused past Fourth dimension Machine running on your external drive.

You will demand to turn off Time Machine. Yous tin can do this by opening Organization Preferences and unchecking the box next to "Dorsum Up Automatically". Then click Options beside "Testify Fourth dimension Motorcar in menu bar." This will open some other window. Click Abolish and it will plough off the Time Auto.

After you lot turn off the Time Automobile, redo steps 4 to 6.

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How to Partition an External Hard Drive on Mac

If you take formatted your drive, you tin then sectionalization the drive, which will split up the bulldoze into two formats. This is perfect for anyone who uses Macs and PCs and wants to transfer files between the different operating systems with an external bulldoze. Here's how to practise that:

Open Disk Utility and select the drive that you desire to partition. It is best to click View > Testify All Devices and so y'all tin can select the disk rather than a container.
In the peak bill of fare, select Sectionalization.
Then click the plus sign at the bottom of the pie nautical chart. Every time you lot click this plus sign, a new partition will be created.
Cull a proper noun, format and size for each partition. You can too change the size of each of the partitions past dragging the white dots at the border of the circle.
Finally click Apply.

How to Partition an External Hard Drive on Mac

Why Segmentation a Hard Drive?

Segmentation an external hard drive allows you to have separate drives for Mac, PC, and any other operating system. Now you lot don't have to get out and buy hard drives for every computer you utilise.

A partitioning likewise gives you a defended space for your Time Automobile dorsum-upward files or a bootable backup of your operating system. It besides helps protect your data if your drive gets infected with malware, as information technology would be independent within one of the partitions.

Now that you know how to format an external drive for Mac, cheque out our blog on the departure between an HDD and an SDD.

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