Invaluable! Thank you, Gary! Good to know that Mac OS Extended (Journaled) is still ok to use-my photos are stored on an external drive with that format. I see I created it in 2013, which probably explains why it's the old format!
Hello, I've a Macbook Pro 2019 with 250 GB internal, but I can't even install the software I need, I work on something that requires more. I would like to use my external solid drive as primary and I'm confirming whether to select AFPS or Extended Journaled. It would be to install OS X on that 1 TB SSD external device and also use it, not only to create the installation image. Do you know if I select AFPS again in that case and GUID partition map?
Using an external drive as your system drive will be much slower than an internal. Maybe time for a new Mac if you are using it for work anyway. To answer your question, you need to use APFS/GUID for any system drive today.
When attempting to erase, it repeatedly reports that the General UDisk Media on disk 2 and creating "untitle". unmounted disk, creating the partition map, and unable to write to the block of the device (-69760), operation failed. What do i need to do so as to accomplish the setup? Any information is greatly valued. kindly help me. Reply
For maximum compatibility with Windows and Linux systems (especially legacy versions like Windows 7), if I format a drive with exFAT, I always use the MBR partition scheme. Windows tends to be picky when using GUID, and sometimes throws strange errors or doesn't even show the drive in File Explorer.
Seems like a good man but to complicated for me.This I thought was about mac mot all choices he was giving.Just find the external drive ....Then format it ...then send files to external drive..
Once again, I learned something I didn't know. I've always pre-formatted Time Machine drives. I had no idea TM would do that on its own, automatically. Amazing. Thanks, Gary.
Same, as the options were Journaled, ExFAT, Windows etc in the drop list, but once choose the scheme from Master Boot to GUID the 'Convert to APFS' came up, made 2 500gb partitions 1 for my saved stuff, and 1 for Time Machine, though maybe went too big on the 500gb partition for time machine lol, am sure can reduce it.
For some of us it isn't rare to use a drive between mac and pc. Yes, we have cloud services, but we also have moving between work and home and blocks from work on personal devices. I still need one drive to be for both, unfortunately. When my clients and bosses move into the 21st century to the cloud and Microsoft 365 on Mac works equivalent to Windows, then we can be permanently Mac. Just adding two cents here for those of us who don't have the luxury of having it all. Corporate blockages, grrr.
Love the way you get right into a topic, state it in simple terms, and then end the video promptly (rather than vloggers who want to tell their life stories along with a plethora of if's and's or but's)
This is one of the best RU-vid tutorials I have ever seen. Clear communication, each step explained as to why and how, and anticipates alternative steps depending on your situation.
Gary I’ve heard HFS+ is still a lot better for spinning (disk) drives vs. APFS which is more optimized for SSDs. Apparently APFS is hard on spinning disk drives. Also, important to note that you need to be careful formatting to ExFAT because it’s not journaled. I’d only use that format if you need to transfer data and not as long-term storage. I’ve had a couple ExFAT drives suffer data corruption 😢 Anyway thanks for the great video as always!
-- Also, important to note that you need to be careful formatting to ExFAT because it’s not journaled. I’d only use that format if you need to transfer data and not as long-term storage. I’ve had a couple ExFAT drives suffer data corruption 😢-- THIS, OMG MY OBS RECORDING ARE DELETED, it has all 0KB because of corruption :( BECAREFUL WITH ExFAT; All EXes are bad.
Gary, it might just be my experience with my personal Macs, but I've found that platter hard drives formatted as APFS don't behave as well as platter hard drives formatted with HFS+ (Mac OS Extended). SSDs? APFS for sure, for lots of reasons. But my experience has been that HFS+ is better for HDDs. (I know, platter drives are so last century. But lots of people still have them, even if many of those are just for archival storage.)
Unfortunately I still need to use platter drives for my massive music library which is over 6TB, and SSDs are still prohibitively expensive in that size range.
I have a 5gb WD ELEMENT EXTERNAL DRIVE that I want to format. I want to partition it to 1gb for Time Machine since my drive on my iMac is 1gb. The other portion I would like to use for other files. What format do I use. Thank you.
Don't do that. Use the whole thing for Time Machine. 1GB is not enough. Remember that Time Machine stores multiple versions of your files. So as you edit a document it will save a history of that document so you can revert to a previous version if you need it. So for a 1GB drive, I would backup to 2 GB minimum, but 5 GB is better. Get another drive if you want to store other files. One reason is to provide as much space to Time Machine as you can. The other is because you can't backup your "other files" to the same drive (it wouldn't really be a backup then). See ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Wmlpup2lIYI.html
Hi Gary, thank you so much for this easy to follow video. I'd like to add my experience of not seeing APFS in the first instance of trying to reformat an external drive in case others experience it too. When I plugged in my LaCie etxernal drive (came formatted as exFAT), Disk Utility showed Master Boot Record under Scheme, and only Mac OS Extended and FAT were offered under Format. I had to change the Scheme to GUID before APFS (and its variations) was offered under Format. Once both APFS and GUID are selected, I could reformat the drive correctly.
APFS - If you're using macOS High Sierra or newer. 'Mac OS Extended Journaled' for macOS Sierra or earlier. Typically for external drives I use the latter.
APFS case sensitive can be helpful, too! What that option allows you to do is to specify filenames with different cases (i.e. upper case and lower case) and the filesystem would keep track of that case sensitivity. This can be useful if you use case sensitivity to differentiate versions of files for instance (i.e. two files have the same name but different letter casing to indicate version).
I really don't get why "case sensitive' existed.. because you can do that anyway even .... do have a "unique" option, just for something you can already do,.. doesn't really do anything difference. Apart from the fact you don't have to manually rename.
Just purchased a WD external hard drive, so thank you so much for your video. I like th part of using TimeMachine to set it up. Question , I found a short dongle cable usb C to usb3 specified for 5GBPS gen1usb3, will it work to connect MacBook air 2019 to the external hard drive. Also if I use TimeMachine can I choose what to upload to external drive or does it back up everything. Thank you.
Time Machine backs up everything. You can manually exclude things, but only do that if you really have a good reason and know what you are doing. As for the cable, try it and see.
Very useful. One tip I can add is that if you do wish to encrypt do it at the start because if you later on decide to encrypt a disk it can take days to reformat "on the fly"
Super helpful and precise video! After much time searching for the right answer, I finally got it here. No issues now with Photoshop and Scratch Disk. Thank You!
I could not for the life of me figure out how to transfer files from meh old Mac mini to my brand new Mac mini. Using the Time Machine was the answer, since I didn't have a spare monitor and keyboard. The only thing different about your tutorial from my own experience is that my external disc would not show up in Time Machine as an option until I manually formatted it to APFS in Disc Utility. It did not automatically do it nor gave me the option to do it. But it worked after all! Thanks for your great videos. I've learned lots from you since becoming a Mac person a couple of years ago.-
Just what I needed. Had that problem with my external drive and wasn't able to find anything helpful on their website. Was getting real frustrated when I finally found your video. Thanks a lot!
ExFat doesn't support the same level of security as NTFS. For this reason, when using Windows with the same drive, i'd rather dual partition. Ya, i know i'm introducing problems copying between partitions (NTFS Mac cannot write, and HFS+ Windows not supported without third party) or on either, or a totally separate drive for each.. But since all i use are Windows VM's, i just mount my Mac-formatted drive and enable "File sharing"
You are brilliant, simple and straight forward, no BS at all, unlike some other RU-vidrs. Super easy to understand for a Mac dummy like me LOL. Keep up the good work!! 💪💪
APFS is an excellent file system which allows variable volume size and that can be very useful and saves space. I would not recommend ex-fat for switching between mac and windows because mac or windows can get confused easily and you lose all your data. I have tried it myself.
@@RedArrow73 I used to but after losing data twice I stopped doing that. I switched between Mac and PC often with exfat formatted hard drive. Suddenly Mac and PC could not read my hard drive anymore!
good luck recovering data from a apfs drive in case of failure. exFAT is still better just because it is actually possible to recover your data from a failed drive.
@@kevinstarofficial you might be right but with the new SSD drives and NVMe the rate of failure is very low. I had seen a lot of old mechanical hard drives crashes at least once a year but in more than 10 years that I have been using SSD and NVMe I have seen none. So I am not gonna use ex-fat just because in 100 years my drive can crash. I have set up my computer to make automatic backups anyway!
Thanks Gary - very useful info as always. I have an SSD attached to my Mac formatted as Mac OS Extended (Journaled), soon to be transferred to a new Mac. Should I re-format as APFS? Is there a benefit to this?
If I create an image of the drive and format the drive with Apple Partition Map. Can I send the data back to the drive if it comes from an MBR disk. Somehow, I converted it in my Pismo and now I cant boot from it. ;)
3:08 I think this is a poor justification and excuse for something that has a real world use case in the business world. Transferring multiple GB over cloud is not practical.
When I plug my drive in to my mac it automatically does a system backup. I want to use this drive to offload files not to backup my system. How do I get it to stop doing the automatic backup?
Does anyone know if it’s possible to index an XFAT formatted drive so that it can be searched with spotlight? I formatted a few external drives (both spinning and SSD) as XFAT in case I moved them over to my Linux server, but noticed after I loaded them up that they don’t appear to be searchable.
Hi, i have a 2012 Mac Pro but when autodetect it says "no HFS+ file systems found" I used this program on a old 2004 mac and it seemed to work and bring up all the files. Can this program read all old and newish mac file systems? using HSF Explorer 2020.9.17
Hi Gary. I am looking to move some photos from an old Mac to an external SSD. But I want to then use a new machine running the latest OSX to access them. What format should I use for the drive so it works with both? I then want to use a second drive as a Time Machine drive to back up my new Mac and the external drive. What format should I use for this? Thanks if you can help.
If the old Mac doesn't support APFS, then you have no choice but to use HFS+ for the transfer. Otherwise, it doesn't matter. Then you can reformat to APFS for Time Machine use after that. Note that SSDs don't make good Time Machine drives because they are usually too small. They are fast (and expensive) which isn't what you need for a backup. Better to have a large, but slower, HDD for Time Machine. FYI.
Great video! When attempting to reformat my Seagate I just purchased, I only had Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and Mac OS Extended (Case-sensitive, journaled), with MS-DOS and ExFat. Would Mac OS Extended (Journaled) work for my Mac?
Thank you so much. I have a t7 shield and it doesn’t have APFS! Will I be able to use Mac extended (journaled) for Time Machine? And then use this drive for a Mac I plan to get in the future? For example to transfer data to a newer MacBook? I currently have a MacBook Pro 2015 on Monterey ( latest version). I’m worried that it will be unreadable by a newer Mac? And exFAT can definitely be used by newer Mac’s too? So sorry for the questions and hope this makes sense!!
APFS isn't something a drive "has." It is a format. If it isn't formatted as APFS now then you can erase and reformat it as APFS in Disk Utility. If you go to use it for Time Machine then it MUST be formatted as APFS or HFS+ (can't remember what Monterey requires). So Time Machine would reformat it when you set it up.
Previous Mac Mini (w/ Big Sur) used Toshiba external hard drive [Mac OS Extended (Journaled)] for Time Machine. Since attaching the external drive to the new Mac Mini (Ventura 13.6.1, M2 chip) I get this message: "Time Machine couldn't complete the backup to"Time Machine Backup". An error occurred while starting the backup. Anti-virus software may be preventing Time Machine from writing to the backup". As with the previous Mini I don't have antivirus software. Should I delete what's on the external drive then reformat it or is there a better option?
Hi MacMost! General question that relates to this video... I have a external hard drive that I formatted on my games console (Xbox/PS), to use as storage for my games... If I wanted to stop using it as game storage for my Xbox/PS and reformat it so I can use that hard drive for my mac instead, how would I do that? Are the steps to doing that in this video or do you have another video covering this topic? Thanks :)
Just bought a new WD HD (the old one was filled up!) for Time Machine usage, and NOTHING worked when trying to install it! I got no prompt from Time Machine when connecting, and when trying do it directly from the Time Machine setting, it did not detect the WD HD! Yet the WD HD was visible via Finder. Tried to format it myself, it failed. Then opened the included WD file, ref Mac and then tried to format again, failed saying that is was some other file open. Then I disconnected the HD and deleted the downloaded file from WD HD on the desktop. Connected the WD HD again, and tried to format, finally it worked, just took 5 sec. Then via the Setting, the Time Machine program finally found the new WD HD, and I could add it, so just now my IMac is doing the first back-up. So very simple in theory, but sometimes really a tough lottery in real life! So installing the WD HD was a small hell for me, therefore disappointed re the installation features.
Furthermore I can see that the format has been "case-sensitive", never chosen by me. Perhaps a new feature, that the program want to use? BTW; I have selected encryption, when setting up the Time Machine.
My drive was formatted APFS out of the box. I plugged it in and it works for Time Machine backups. However, I cannot save any files to it. Any advice to make the drive work for Time Machine and external storage?
You should never use a Time Machine drive for anything else. See ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Wmlpup2lIYI.html Get another drive if you need to have an archive or something like that.
Daer Gary, Good day, Hope all is well, i would like the ask you help to suggest for me the best Hard Disk SSD 4TB External for my Macbook pro M2. And i would to ask you other question pls, if i have sent a mail from outlook Version 16.77.1 and i would like to recall this worng mail can be outlook in mac Thanks for your help and support. Best Regards.
I don't review products, so I haven't tried all of the variations. So check with review sites for a full picture. I can only point you to the one I do have: macmost.com/recommendations I don't use Outlook, but in general email cannot be recalled once it has been sent. You can't reach onto another person's computer and take the message back.
Can formatting a external drive delete that drives firmware? Or its recently updated firmware? Why do dome external SSD drives updates firmware? Like Samsung T7 for example. We never used to update external drives' firmware before 🤔
Why is it that I don't see all those format options when clicking the erase button? M1 Max macbook pro running Ventura 13.0. Lacie Rugged 1TB drive. Thanks for the help!
What if you have back ups from an older version of Mac OS then wish to move it to a new Mac with a different new Mac OS ie Yosemite, Catalina or Big Sur (on old Macs) to Sonoma (on a brand new Mac) will transferring everything over still work? Im not sure if time machine ignores the actual OS and just moves all 'my' stuff over. It sounds silly but ive never used Time Machine, it just back ups in the background and id have to use RU-vid to even find how to restore a backup lol Also, does it move all the crap thats maybe making my system slow, ie old application files, unseen little bugs etc, or is time machine particular about what its actually saving for restore/transfer later
You can continue to use the old backup drive, but it is a good idea to start a new one, maybe with a more appropriate size for your new Mac. Good idea to replace your Time Machine drive at that point anyway as drives only last so long.
I have a 2012 Macbook Pro, I"m running MacOS Mojave 10.14.6. I haven't updated it to Catalina which is as up to date as this computer will go because some programs I use work on Mojave and I'm not sure if they all will work on Catalina without upgrading several things. I'm hoping to get a new mac sometime this year but I'm still using this one. (I'm a full time musician/music teacher, I use my computer for recording audio and editing video and have some programs I use to write and teach music). I bought a 2TB Samsung T7 shield external SSD. So is it be better for me to partition this SSD drive? Perhaps videos in one partition, audio projects or sample libraries in a different partition, backup in another partition? etc...? Or would you suggest I just go ahead and update to Catalina and then format the drive? Thanks in advance for any suggestions.
To store data on it, like videos and audio, there is no need to partition. It would just complicate things. Just create folders and organize things as you like. As for your backup, you should get a separate drive (A larger HDD, not an SSD) to use for that. See ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Wmlpup2lIYI.html
Can you format a drive from NTFS to Mac OS Extended on a windows system? Reason being I don't have a Mac currently but bought one to fix up and am trying to make a bootable drive to use on the mac to load up a new OS (Sierra).
Great video. Do you have a tutorial to remove time machine from an external drive? I'd like to use my external drive for photo storage. HOW?? Thanks :)
Very helpful! Follow up questions: (1) If price is not a factor, would it be better to use external SSD or HDD for Time Machine? (Samsung T7 4TB is now just a little over $200). (2) I have some HDD drives that are A/C powered and some HDD drives that are USB powered. If I choose to use an HDD for Time Machine, is one preferable over the other? Thank you!
HDD. SSD are smaller. Get a big HDD instead. A 12TB HDD can store more data and a much longer history than a 4TB SSD. (And price is ALWAYS a factor. Do you really want to throw money away on something you don't need?) Whether you use AC or USB power is up to you. It will work the same. Some find the USB power neater (fewer cables, more portable) but usually the AC ones are cheaper and come in bigger sizes. I use an AC-powered one for those two reasons.
One of my older drives allows me to use Time Machine AND also drag/drop files into new folders WITH ONE PARTITION, but when I format a new external drive for Time Machine it won't let me create new folders in the drive root. Is there a way to have both on one partition? I see plenty of answers claiming that I need multiple partitions but I'm not crazy about that...
You should NOT try to do that. Use the drive just for Time Machine. Anything you manually do to the drive will hurt Time Machine's ability to manage the space. See ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Wmlpup2lIYI.html for reasons.
Excellent video! Just purchased a 4 TB NVme for my external enclosure - the reminders at the end helped me format safely. Thanks for the peace of mind!
THANKS A MILLION GARY!!! I've tried 3 different SSDs in my Mac docking station and you're the first person who's told me that they're not being read because they haven't been formatted. In the absence of any other instruction, I assumed they would be Plug and play. My new disc is now working fine.
What's the use case? Communicating over a network or cloud service doesn't care about the drive format. So it would only be if you needed to use the same drive on two different systems.
Thanks for posting Gary. Excellent video as always. Quick question: I just purchased a Lacie External HD. I am not using it for Time Machine ( I have a separate drive for that). But it appears the drive is already formatted for MAC. Do you suggest deleting everything anyway, or just leaving the formatting as it arrived?
Depends on how you format it. Not sure what formats your Android phone uses. ExFAT is probably what would work on all, but it isn't best for Macs. So I would only use it if the purpose of the drive is to transfer data between these devices for some reason.
Got a ssk that was used for a windows Op. I tried formatting it on my mac but when I got done with the format the drive stoped disappeared.any clue as to what might have happen, and how to fix it?
Did you format the whole drive (as opposed to just a volume on it?) Make sure you have View, Show All Devices turned on in Disk Utility. Then you can also select the drive in Disk Utility and use the Mount button to mount it.
Another great video! But my question is what if I want to use this for a time machine and also extra folders because it seems like I set it up and use it only for time machine. Now I’m trying to create folders (to save my music and photos) and it will not let me do that.
Should not use apfs on spinning drives. It spreads the data all over the drive and does not defrag it properly. It was designed for ssds where those things dont matter, but they definitely do on spinning disks. Whilst technically apfs will work, the experience over time will degrade especially with large file work transfers
How are you, my Sandisk usb will not work in my printer, i wiped it clean and tried formatting it but my Epson wont recognize it, but it recognized it before i formatted the Sandisk for something else, what can i do
Very, very helpful. My new ADATA HDD was formatted for Windows and Mac Time Machine would not recognize it, though the MacBook Pro did. You made it easy to find how to reformat it. Thank you so much. I am a new subscriber, but have listened to several of your videos. You do a real good job. Kudos!
