To create partitions larger than 32 gb in fat32 when reformatting the drive, download the external usbfirewire fat32 formatting utility from. There are specific thirdparty systems, like digital camcorders, and sony playstation 3, which need the drives to be formatted in either fat32 or exfat format to perform read from and. Heres how to format a drive if you are planning to use it with a mac. Hard drives formatted to exfat or fat32 can read and write data on both mac and pc. It will format a western digital external usb or firewire hard drive back to its original fat32 partition and format. Tech support scams are an industrywide issue where scammers trick you into paying for unnecessary technical support services.
This utility will format a western digital external usb or firewire hard drive back to its original fat32 partition and format. Jun 22, 2018 western digital mac ntfs driver download while in there, open utilities, and lastly doubleclick on disk utility. We would like to show you a description here but the site wont allow us. Wd passport for mac to fat32 or ntfs other software. A window will come up showing that formatting and partitioning the drive will erase all data that is on. How to format wd my passport for mac and pc free easeus. Now rightclick on the unallocated space or the black bar to see a menu of available options, and click on new simple volume the welcome to the new simple volume wizard will appear. Jun 28, 2018 western digital mac ntfs driver for windows disk utility will begin the formatting and repartitioning process. Apple may provide or recommend responses as a possible solution based on the information provided. How to switch a wd passport from a mac to pc small business.
How to format wd my passport for mac and pc easeus. Mar 28, 2008 western digital external usbfirewire fat32 formatting utility 1. Why can i not play media files from a mac formatted. Wd fat32 formatter free download wd fat32 formatter 2. Tool 1 disk utility provided by mac os, the best free tool to format device disk utility the best free mac format and erase tool that is provided by apple inc. On the main panel, click the wd my passport ultra 1tb drives icon, and select the format button. System utilities downloads wd fat32 formatter by western digital technologies and many more programs are available for instant and free download. How to format hard drive to fat32 file system up to 2tb. Apr 16, 2020 step 3 once the disk utility opens, select your western digital hard drive from the sidebar.
Fat or file allocation table 32 is the format using, in which windows stores data on the hard disk drive. However, with all of the different drive manufacturers, interfaces and other compatibility and formatting issues that hard drives can have, sometimes the best choice is to use specialty. Formatting partitioning software free download ccm. Magic western digital hard disk formatting and partitioning. Use the mac os disk utility to format the drive to msdos fat32. For apple mac users, the easier way to format usb flash drive to fat32 is using the disk utility. Usb disk storage format tool by authorsoft corporation is a free utility that allows you to easily format your usb flash drives. Oct 15, 2015 hi there, i use a macbook pro and have a wd passport for mac. This utility will not reformat the partition on the netcenter, wd my book world edition, or wd my book world edition ii hard drive as fat32. Western digital external usbfirewire fat32 formatting. From the disk utility window, select the passport hard drive.
This process is data destructive and cannot be undone. On the pc, use the western digital disk management utility to format the drive as raid1. The best free western digital hard drive formatting and partitioning software can help format wd drives in ntfs, fat32, ext2, ext3 as well as manage wd partitions in a more flexible way whether you want to create, resize, move, copy, merge, wipe partitions, or recover lost, deleted or. Connect the usb fash drive to the mac os x computer. The two most popular operating systems, windows and mac os both have formatting utilities builtin, which makes formatting external drives even more convenient. Software and firmware downloads wd support western digital. Download wd fat32 formatter format western digital usb drives or wirefire hard disk drives to bring them to factory configurations as well as restore wd disk icon files. The release date of usb disk storage format tool for mac is unknown and we cannot say for sure if it will be released at all. How to format a wd hard drive to exfat or fat32 file system imageseu. Western digital offers an expansive portfolio of technologies, storage devices, systems and solutions for businesses and consumers alike. The easiest way to format the drive to fat32 or exfat is by using macoss built in disk utility or windows builtin disk management.
Wd my passport ultra 1tb setup and troubleshooting guide. External usbfirewire fat32 formatting utility this utility will format a western digital external usb or firewire hard drive back to its original fat32 partition and format file name. Follow the details below to convert wd my passport to fat32 or exfat. Download western digital my book office edition external. Lg said it needs to be formatted to fat32 or ntfs for the tv to recognise it. For mac computers, go to the apple menu and select software update. For windows, it offers quick format feature when you rightclick the hard drive on the computer.
Nov 19, 2009 i am having a huge dilemma with my new western digital 4tb hard drive. If you are using such brand hard drive, you can use their tools to accomplish the task. How to format wd external drive for mac apple community. How to format 1tb western digital fat32 in windows 7 step by step. Additionally, some scammers may try to identify themselves as a microsoft mvp. Apr 26, 2010 does anyone know where i can get a formatting tool to format an external hard drive to fat32 using windows 7 oem 32 bit. Now, youll see the erase dialogue windows and here, choose the volume format dropdown list to select the exfat or fat file system. I want to use a western digital elements external hard drive 500 gbgo on my panasonic blu ray recorder dmrbw850. This utility will format a western digital external usb or firewire hard drive back to its original. Apr 16, 2020 you can format your western digital my passport external hard drive to fat32 or exfat format to transfer the data between a mac and windows system conveniently. Formatting nfts to fat32 external drives for pc wd community. However, the formatted data can be recovered by data.
Some of the hard drive manufacturers have created their own tools for converting a drive which is larger than 32 gb to fat32, such as seagate discwizard and western digital wd fat32 formatting tool. Apacer formatting utility freeware free download apacer. According to the solutions above, the easeus partition tool stands out for its convenience and easiness. To make your western digital hard drive work on both mac and windows computers, you need to format the drive with the fat32 file system. Software by product, software for windows, software. Hp usb disk storage format tool is a windowsbased formatting utility for. Easily use your wd my passport for mac and windows in 7 steps. Instructions on how to format to fat32 in either windows or mac wd. The data recovery tool in question supports all western digital hard disk drives, such as my book pro, my book, wd elements, my book studio, etc. Therefore, some user needs western digital fat32 formatting utility because he wants to connect his ntfsformatted my passport ultra to mac os. Wd quick formatter tool allows you to reformat wd external hard drive to ntfs, fat32, etc. You can also use wd fat32 formatter for formatting more than 32gb disk area.
Need to reformat a 500gb western digital drive to fat32. Apacer formatting utility software free download apacer. All you have to do is pick the drive you want to convert to fat32 and proceed with the formatting operation. This wd device is preformatted as a single fat32 partition for compatibility with all updated windows and macintosh operating systems. Can someone please take me through step by step on how to reformat the hard drive. If you are using a mac, you can run the builtin disk utility to quickly format a hard drive or external hard drive under mac os. In order to partition a hard drive, generally, the system reinstallation is. How to format an external hard drive with wd quick. This site contains user submitted content, comments and opinions and is for informational purposes only. Fat32 is an improvement over original fat and uses bits to locate clusters stored on the disk. To format a usb flash drive to fat32 in mac os x follow these steps. If he switches his wd drive between windows os and mac os frequently like dual boot os on a pc, he needs to format the drive to a file system which works well in both operating systems. Open the utility after the installation and then select the wd driver to be formatted.
May 25, 2020 therefore, some user needs western digital fat32 formatting utility because he wants to connect his ntfsformatted my passport ultra to mac os. Using the xp disk management utility under computer management, select the disk, initialize the drive, but dont format. Formatting a 3tb external hard drive microsoft community. Now, the erase dialogue window appears, here select the volume format dropdown list and choose msdos fat or exfat file system. Aug 16, 2017 smartdisk fat32 format utility size 401 kb. The fat32 file system has a maximum individual file size limit of 4 gb. Our datacentric solutions are comprised of the western digital, gtechnology, sandisk, upthere and wd brands. Format your western digital my passport external hard drive to fat32 or exfat format so to transfer the data between a mac and windows system conveniently. Hello, i tried formating my wd office ediotion by using run command at first i thought my drive is already formating it, but when it hit 99 percent format it declared that the volume is too big, my office edition is 640 gb by the way. I want to download files on the passport to then watch on my lg tv using the usb port. The best free western digital hard drive formatting and partitioning software can help format wd drives in ntfs, fat32, ext2, ext3 as well as manage wd partitions in a more flexible way whether you want to create, resize, move, copy, merge, wipe partitions, or recover lost, deleted or hidden wd partitions, you can use it to do it.
How to format a wd hard drive to exfat or fat32 file system. Western digital manufactures the passport line of portable external hard drives. How to format usb flash drive to fat32 in mac os x. This was okay but i couldnt use fat32 for my desktop since i had files larger than 4gb and i have heard fat32 cannot handle those. Both windows and mac os offer builtin disk formatting tool.
Easily format wd western digital portable hard drive on mac. May 25, 2012 for xp there is a free download for exfat from microsoft if its not already installed. In order to ensure the right driver download, official driver links from western digital are listed at first. Windows xp windows vista windows 2000 windows 7 windows 8 windows 10. Downloads download software and updates for your wd product. There should also be an opensource driver for it, but i could never get it to work. So you might want to use other applications to format your external storage devices. The formatting tool on w7 will only format hard drives as exfat, which does not work, only fat32 works. You can choose to format the drive on the mac, however its better done on the pc. It can track files that are fragmented into various areas on the hard disk. Fat32 formatter is provided by ridgecrop consultant limited and is a window application with a graphical user interface.
It is usually used to repair a corrupted external hard disk. Does anyone know where i can get a formatting tool to format. Next, download the wd fat32 formatting utility on your system and install it on your system. So, after i had done this formatting in leopard, i plugged my external back into my desktop and reformatted the fat32 partition to an ntfs partition. While some dashcameras use fat32 sd cards with up to 32gb, others are formatted as exfat to be able to surpass this storage limit such as sandisk and. The western digital hard disk drive is a storage device where you can save large data. The wd hard drive format utility can be used to unlock and lock the drive or hide your sensitive information from an unknown person.
Formatting nfts to fat32 external drives for pc wd. Wd fat32 formatter is a external usbfirewire fat32 formatting utility. Ntfs for mac os x is a software that allows detecting an ntfs storage device. Now, click the erase, button and wait a few minutes and let the macos. Select the fat32 option and enter the name of the hard drive.
You can format your western digital my passport external hard drive to fat32 or exfat format to transfer the data between a mac and windows system conveniently. To get started, choose the western digital brand youd like help with. Free download western digital fat32 formatting tool for. How to share an external drive between a mac and a pc. Heres something your my passport for mac quick install guide might not tell you. Now, have western digital fat32 formatting utility download freely and have a try. Product firmware product if your product is not listed above, please visit the product page. This utility formats your western digital external hard drive back to its original fat32 partition and format. Here is a list of disk or usb formatting tools for mac or ways of formatting diskusb flash on mac to get it done. Free download western digital fat32 formatting tool for windows. Does anyone know where i can get a formatting tool to.
I want to format my wd my passport essential 500gb into fat32 but i only see the options ntfs or exfat. Select the entire drive on the left pick the drive makers name and size then partiton. Connect the 1tb wd drive to your computer and make sure it is detected by windows. There may be some complicated instructions claim that can help you format wd portable hard drive on mac. Feb 09, 2008 a 320gb fat32 partition and a 150gb hfs partition. Formatting would erase data completely, make sure that you have a data backup. Tap the erase option and wait till the information is erased. Formatting wd elements for mac by quick workarounds. Download western digital my book office edition external usb. Wd quick formatter tool download is available on western digital official website. Because there is no quick format feature in mac os and there is no disk partition tool for mac hard disk drive. Sometimes, there will be a need to learn how to reformat my passport for mac, so once youre acquainted with formatting, you should enlighten yourself on how to reformat wd my passport for mac. However, for some mac users, formatting a wd portable hard drive on mac is not as easy as formatting a hard drive on pc. For instance, you need to format internal wd hdd where system installed sometimes.