- How To Use My Passport For Mac
- How To Format My Passport For Mac Os X Before Using It
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- My Passport For Mac Instructions
- My Passport For Mac Instructions
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Mar 25, 2018 I have recently bought a “My Passport” External HD. And, I am a Mac User. Running Mac OS X 10.6.8. Where and with working to reformat my new HD, I have been directed to base “Support” and then 'Knowledge Base Answer ID 3865. Where, I am seeing “Instruction” links, for Mac Operating System, for as far back as Mac OS X 10.7. Mac OS Extended. Choose one of the following Mac OS Extended file system formats for compatibility with Mac computers using macOS 10.12 or earlier. Mac OS Extended (Journaled): Uses the Mac format (Journaled HFS Plus) to protect the integrity of the hierarchical file system. Dec 07, 2018 You don’t need software. You just need to reformat it. It’s probably in NTFS format so you can’t write to it from the Mac. Use Disk Utility to reformat as HFS+ if you’re only going to use it with.
HomeHow ToMacsHow to Format WD My Passport for Mac
WD My Passport gives photographers and videographers portable storage to easily offload, edit and stream photos and videos. If you’re a photographer or videographer, you likely have various different devices, including the WD My Passport. Despite how beneficial WD My Passport is, there is a problem many users report. Since Mac computers have their own native file systems, a WD My Passport is incompatible. The WD My Passport drive is read only on your Mac. This makes the drive quite useless. Luckily, you can easily format WD My Passport for your Mac.
Formatting WD My Passport will not only allow you to have full storage of your WD My Passport, but will also remove virus-infected files. Before you begin formatting your WD My Passport device, it’s best to first ensure that you have a backup saved. The process below involves erasing your WD My Passport. If you have important information saved on your WD My Passport device, it’s best to ensure you have a backup saved. It’s better to be safe than sorry.
Formatting WD My Passport for your Mac is very easy, and will only require a few moments of your time. You’ll be using Disk Utility, in order to format WD My Passport for your Mac. In order to get started, and learn how to format WD My Passport for your Mac, follow the simple instructions below.
Use Disk Utility to Format WD My Passport for Your Mac
As stated above, ensure you have a backup of your WD My Passport before you begin the process below. You’ll be using Disk Utility in order to format your WD My Passport on your Mac. Disk Utility is built-in on your Mac and is commonly used to erase, format or manage internal disks and external storage. Disk Utility is a very beneficial tool, that will make your life much easier. In order to get started and use Disk Utility to format WD My Passport on your Mac, follow the simple instructions below.
1. Connect your WD My Passport drive to your Mac computer, as you normally would. Wait as your Mac operating system detects and mounts the drive to use. A new hard drive icon should appear on your Desktop.
2. Launch Finder.
3. Using the menu bar towards the top left, click on Go.
4. From the drop-down menu that appears, click on Utilities.
5. Launch Disk Utility.
6. After Disk Utility launches, select your WD My Passport drive from the sidebar.
7. Click on the Erase tab.
8. An erase dialog window will appear. From here, you’ll be able to select the Volume Format. From the drop-down menu, choose MS-DOT(FAT) or ex-FAT File System. Traditionally. Ex-FAT is the better option, when it comes to Mac computers.
![My passport for mac tutorial My passport for mac tutorial](/uploads/1/3/3/2/133278876/218966249.png)
9. Click on Erase.
How To Use My Passport For Mac
That’s all it takes. Please be patient as your Mac operating system erases the data on your drive, in order to format it by FAT32 or ex-FAT. This may take some time. After the formatting process has completed, you can feel free to use your drive in Mac OS X as a regular hard drive.
Disk Utility is a secure platform, so there’s no need to worry about breech of privacy. You’ll be able to easily erase your WD My Passport device. The best part about this method is that there’s no need for any sort of third-party software, or tool. This method is completely free.
As stated above, it’s best you back up your WD My Passport before carrying out the method above. It’s better to be safe than sorry. It will only take you a few moments of your time to back up your WD My Passport drive.
You have the option to format your WD My Passport external drive to FAT#@ or ex-FAT if you’d like to transfer data between a Mac and Windows system. It’s best to choose ex-FAT, as stated above. This is because there are limitations on FAT32, which makes it not useful for every user. FAT32 also affects your Mac’s performance. Overall, it’s preferable to stick to ex-FAT. Ex-FAT will support maximum volumes up to 128 PiB and the maximum supported file size is 128 PiB.
Admittedly, the chances of corruption on your WD My Passport drive increase when used with your Mac. This is true for PC users as well. This is why it’s essential you make back ups of your external drive, whenever possible. It’s recommended to make back ups of any technological device you own, as errors happen often. Both ex-FAT and FAT32 aren’t widely used, and this may be why support varies amongst third-party devices. You don’t want to lose all of your important data, only to regret it later. It’s better to be safe than sorry, in this case.
When I bought the WD My Passport Ultra drive, I was surprised to see that it didn’t support OS X out of the box. Yes, it had some software specifically made for OS X on it, but even that didn’t help. Turns out, it just wasn’t in the right format. These hard drives are customized to run well on Windows (as you’d expect), and they don’t run well with OS X.
So to get it running, what we’ll need to do is format it in Journaled format, which is OS X only format or MS-DOS (FAT), which means it will run with both OS X and Windows. If you’re only going to be using the hard drive on a Mac, I recommend you stick with Journaled.
How To Format My Passport For Mac Os X Before Using It
Why You Need to Re-Format the External Hard Drive
When I first got the hard drive, I wasn’t able to copy anything over to it (but I was able to copy from it). Disk Utility showed that it was formatted to MS-DOS (FAT) but I’m pretty sure it would have been NTFS instead. If you experience the same issue, your only recourse is to reformat it in one of two formats.
If you’re only going to use the external hard drive with Macs or you want to use it for Time Machine backups, format it in Mac OS Extended (Journaled). If you’re like me who also needs to use at least a part of the hard drive from Windows PCs, you’ll need to choose MS-DOS (FAT) format. But here you won’t get great support for Time Machine. Plus you can’t make partitions bigger than 2 TB or move files larger than 4 GB around.
How to Re-Format the External Hard Drive
First, connect the external hard drive, bring up Spotlight Search by using the keyboard shortcut Cmd + Space and type in Disk Utility. Press Enter and Disk Utility will launch. You can also find it in Utilities folder in Applications.
Now, from the left column select 1 TB WD My Passport (or whatever your hard drive name is), and click on the Erase tab.
From here, in Format, select Mac OS Extended (Journaled), give it a name if you want, and click Erase.
You’ll get a warning. Again, click Erase.
In a couple of seconds, you’ll have an OS X ready hard drive to go.
Related: Check out our Ultimate Guide to OS X Yosemite.How to Create Partitions
I’m planning on using my hard drive for both Time Machine backups and to carry media files around. I might need to use the hard drive with Windows computers so I’m going to format one of the partitions as MS-DOS (FAT), fully aware of its limitations. The other one, for Time Machine backups, will be in Mac OS Extended (Journaled) format.
To create a partition, select the hard drive from the left column and click the Partition tab.
From the drop-down below Partition Layout, select the number of partitions you want. Don’t go overboard here.
Now, just below, you’ll see a visual representation of the partitions. You can use the breakpoint to change the size of the partitions by moving it up or down. You can also click on a partition, give it a name and select the format.
Once you’ve decided all the details, simply click the Apply button. From the pop-up, select Partition.
Disk Utility: Check out the two tips for using Disk Utility and 8 ways to free up space on your Mac.What Do You Use It For?
What are you planning on doing with the external hard drive? Time Machine backups perhaps? Or just storing media? Share with us in our forums section.
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