Bobc163 Loc: Australia NSW

well the other half has now gone completely over to the "other side" :mrgreen: she has changed her laptop running windows to Macbook air
she has a standalone hard drive with all of her photos on it When she plugs the hard drive into the MAc it does not recognise it
Asked apple and they have said that the drive will have to be reformatted for MAc Asked about existing files and was told that they would all be lost!! :evil:
What can we do with the existing files so that they are not lost and what to do with the drive??
Thanks in advance

tsilva Loc: Arizona

Copy them to an online service, format the drive, copy them back

letmedance Loc: Walnut, Ca.

Mac can read Windows files and Drives, there should be no problem. check this link for a good lesson on file transfer to you Mac. http://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201553

BHC Loc: Strawberry Valley, JF, USA

How big is her standalone hard drive and how much does she have on it?

Rongnongno Loc: FL

Apple is always giving the wrong support. Mac reads all NTFS drives.

Check this link....


And you wonder why I will never touch of of these over priced, over hyped gizmos!!! :hunf: :shock: :mrgreen: :XD: :lol: :lol: :lol:

BHC Loc: Strawberry Valley, JF, USA

Yeah, but then you look at all the problems that Windows has and you understand why paranoids like me keep one of each type running at the same time. 8-) 8-) 8-)

blackest Loc: Ireland

I think the issue here is not that she can not read the drive on her mac but cannot write to the drive from her mac.

So it's possible to say open a photo do some edits but then the changes can't be saved to that external drive.

If this is the case, then I would suggest getting a couple more external drives for the mac and format those for the mac and then copy the files from the pc drive to one of the mac formatted drives. The other drive can be used for a time machine backup drive.

If the PC Formatted drive was to fail tomorrow would she lose all/most of her photographs ? Thats why I suggest buying 2 new drives, since drives fail.

It is possible the external drive could have been encrypted by windows for security which would mean it is only readable currently by her windows pc. Not something you would tend to do for a home system in which case the transfer would need to be done via the windows machine.

It is possible to enable write access to an ntfs drive on a mac. If it is running el capitan then paragon (paragon.com) will sell a driver to enable write support to ntfs formatted drives $20 they also have a version to enable reading and writing of mac drives on a pc $20 or both together for $30 . If the mac is running yosemite or lower then paragon will give a free licence for an earlier version of that ntfs driver for free.

It is possible to backup and access files over your network (i'm assuming you have a single internet access point you both share) via networked drives or ftp but perhaps that is something for another time.

bcmink Loc: Monona, WI

Two well respected applications. I prefer the first but they are both quite capable.

http://www.paragon-software.com/home/ntfs-mac/

http://www.tuxera.com/products/tuxera-ntfs-for-mac/

There is no need to buy more drives, transfer files to an HFS formatted drives as others are suggesting. Both of the applications I've listed simply enable OS X to become fully compatible with Fat 32 and NTFS files, folders and drives.

Psergel Loc: New Mexico

The drive doesn't show up in Finder? How about in disk utility?

Your Mac should see the drive but you won't have write permissions until you move the files off to another drive (or cloud or....wherever), format the drive for the Mac and move the files back. Depending on how much is on the drive this can be very time consuming.

If it doesn't show up in Finder at all, I doubt that the problem is formatting.

Just out of curiosity.....is the drive one that gets its power from the USB port or does it have its own power supply?
Also...are you plugging the drive directly into the Mac USB port or to a hub?

blackest Loc: Ireland

You are right you can enable ntfs write support with 3rd party drivers and also by enabling it in fstab too giving the drive its own mount point.

I figured backup is also important to consider which is why i suggested buying external drives. One for time machine and one for working with the mac exclusively.

Most stuff on a computer is replaceable because there are thousands if not millions of copies available. However your photographs are unique and having them stored in just one place is one hard drive failure away from losing them forever.

There is no reason why the drive couldn't be used as a networked drive either shared by a pc (or mac with the right drivers) or by a dedicated nas device. That might be useful and makes the files available to all computers tablets phones ect on the lan.

There are several options open, some are easier to use than others.

bcmink Loc: Monona, WI

Good to address the back up issue as well. The OP didn't really ask about back ups but it is always an issue for most, especially when transitioning from one OS to another. I've kind of given up on recommending terminal command actions, even when they make sense because and especially for mounting drives and editing file tables one can invite a certain level of chaos to the uninitiated.

Gene51 Loc: Yonkers, NY, now in LSD (LowerSlowerDelaware)

Ok, what problems? I have been running several Win7 machines for over 2 years - not even the slightest hiccup. Same goes for my son and daughter who run mixed environments. Today, it is just a nonsense myth that may have been true at one point in time, but is no longer valid. What is interesting and true, is that Mac has several PC compatibility features and runs Intel cpus, and can read but not write to NTFS-formatted drives. Now you won't see any PC-Windows based systems offering Mac compatibility. I wonder why? :)

blackest Loc: Ireland

It is possible to read mac formatted drives on a PC you just need the driver and Paragon make a htfs driver for windows.

Microsoft has always chosen to promote its interests against everyone else. It was kinda caught short when the internet came about, nobody likes lock in. They still play those games, seems that 95% will be fine but if they can they will hold on to a corner so it is 'easier' just to use their products. Although to be fair Apple play the same game too when it can.

Why? it is all about the dollar :)

BobHartung Loc: Bettendorf, IA

Copy them into an external hard drive formatted in FAT32. Then:
1. Make sure the Mac can read the drive satisfactorily.
2. Reformat the original drive to either a Mac partition or FAT32.
3. Copy the files back.

PS. It is not the file format that is the problem as both use the Intel chips, it is the drive as formatted by the OS. Windows, in its wisdom has tweeked/changed theirs to make it harder to interoperate with other operating systems.

jwestman Loc: Grand Rapids, MI

Just a quick word of caution: Don't start messing with anything until you backup the photos somewhere else.