- Format External Hard Drive Macbook Air
- Can't See External Hard Drive
- Format External Hard Drive Mac
- Format External Hard Drive Macbook Pro 17 In 2011
- Format External Drive Windows 10
Erasing your disk: For most reasons to erase, including when reformatting a disk or selling, giving away, or trading in your Mac, you should erase your entire disk.
Part 2: Format External Hard Drive for Mac with Disk Utility. Formatting an external hard drive would erase everything on it. Hence, you must backup your important files before reformatting the drive if you want to save them. The easiest way is to drag it from one drive to another. All is set, then you can go ahead to format the drive on your Mac.
- Oct 17, 2019 Format an External Hard Drive. External hard drives use either spinning disks or solid memory to save your files. On Mac computers, use the Finder app to browse and manage files on your computer and external hard drives. Before a hard drive can read or write data, it must first be formatted, or erased and reconfigured.
- Part 2: Format External Hard Drive for Mac with Disk Utility. Formatting an external hard drive would erase everything on it. Hence, you must backup your important files before reformatting the drive if you want to save them. The easiest way is to drag it from one drive to another. All is set, then you can go ahead to format the drive on your Mac.
Erasing a volume on your disk: In other cases, such as when your disk contains multiple volumes (or partitions) and you don't want to erase them all, you can erase specific volumes on the disk.
Erasing a disk or volume permanently deletes all of its files. Before continuing, make sure that you have a backup of any files that you want to keep.
How to erase your disk
- Start up from macOS Recovery. Then select Disk Utility from the Utilities window and click Continue.
If you're not erasing the disk your Mac started up from, you don't need to start up from macOS Recovery: just open Disk Utility from the Utilities folder of your Applications folder. - Choose View > Show All Devices from the menu bar in Disk Utility. The sidebar now shows your disks (devices) and any containers and volumes within them. The disk your Mac started up from is at the top of the list. In this example, Apple SSD is the startup disk:
- Select the disk that you want to erase. Don't see your disk?
- Click Erase, then complete these items:
- Name: Type the name that you want the disk to have after you erase it.
- Format: Choose APFS or Mac OS Extended (Journaled). Disk Utility shows a compatible format by default.
- Scheme: Choose GUID Partition Map.
- Click Erase to begin erasing your disk and every container and volume within it. You might be asked to enter your Apple ID. Forgot your Apple ID?
- When done, quit Disk Utility.
- If you want your Mac to be able to start up from the disk you erased, reinstall macOS on the disk.
How to erase a volume on your disk
- Start up from macOS Recovery. Then select Disk Utility from the Utilities window and click Continue.
If you're not erasing the volume your Mac started up from, you don't need to start up from macOS Recovery: just open Disk Utility from the Utilities folder of your Applications folder. - In the sidebar of Disk Utility, select the volume that you want to erase. The volume your Mac started up from is named Macintosh HD, unless you changed its name. Don't see your volume?
- Click Erase, then complete these items:
- Name: Type the name that you want the volume to have after you erase it.
- Format: Choose APFS or Mac OS Extended (Journaled). Disk Utility shows a compatible format by default.
- If you see an Erase Volume Group button, the volume you selected is part of a volume group. In that case, you should erase the volume group. Otherwise, click Erase to erase just the selected volume. You might be asked to enter your Apple ID. Forgot your Apple ID?
- When done, quit Disk Utility.
- If you want your Mac to be able to start up from the volume you erased, reinstall macOS on that volume.
Reasons to erase
You can erase at any time, including in circumstances such as these:
- You want to permanently erase all content from your Mac and restore it to factory settings. This is one of the final steps before selling, giving away, or trading in your Mac.
- You're changing the format of a disk, such as from a PC format (FAT, ExFAT, or NTFS) to a Mac format (APFS or Mac OS Extended).
- You received a message that your disk isn't readable by this computer.
- You're trying to resolve a disk issue that Disk Utility can't repair.
- The macOS installer doesn't see your disk or can't install on it. For example, the installer might say that your disk isn't formatted correctly, isn't using a GUID partition scheme, contains a newer version of the operating system, or can't be used to start up your computer.
- The macOS installer says that you may not install to this volume because it is part of an Apple RAID.
About APFS and Mac OS Extended
Disk Utility in macOS High Sierra or later can erase using either the newer APFS (Apple File System) format or the older Mac OS Extended format, and it automatically chooses a compatible format for you.
How to choose between APFS and Mac OS Extended
Disk Utility tries to detect the type of storage and show the appropriate format in the Format menu. If it can't, it chooses Mac OS Extended, which works with all versions of macOS. If you want to change the format, answer these questions:
- Are you formatting the disk that came built into your Mac?
If the built-in disk came APFS-formatted, Disk Utility suggests APFS. Don't change it to Mac OS Extended. - Are you about to install macOS High Sierra or later for the first time on the disk?
If you need to erase your disk before installing High Sierra or later for the first time on that disk, choose Mac OS Extended (Journaled). During installation, the macOS installer decides whether to automatically convert to APFS—without erasing your files. - Are you preparing a Time Machine backup disk or bootable installer?
Choose Mac OS Extended (Journaled) for any disk that you plan to use as a Time Machine backup disk or as a bootable installer. - Will you be using the disk with another Mac?
If the other Mac isn't using macOS High Sierra or later, choose Mac OS Extended (Journaled). Earlier versions of macOS don't work with APFS-formatted volumes.
How to identify the format currently in use
If you want to know which format is currently in use, use any of these methods:
- Select the volume in the Disk Utility sidebar, then check the information shown on the right. For more detail, choose File > Get Info from the Disk Utility menu bar.
- Open System Information and select Storage in the sidebar. The File System column on the right shows the format of each volume.
- Select the volume in the Finder, then choose File > Get Info from the menu bar. The Get Info window shows the Format of that volume.
If your disk or volume doesn't appear, or the erase fails
- Shut down your Mac, then unplug all nonessential devices from your Mac.
- If you're erasing an external drive, make sure that it's connected directly to your Mac using a cable that you know is good. Then turn the drive off and back on.
- If your disk or volume still doesn't appear in Disk Utility, or Disk Utility reports that the erase process failed, your disk or Mac might need service. If you need help, please contact Apple Support.
Learn more
- If you can't start up from macOS Recovery, you can use a different startup disk instead.
- If Disk Utility shows a Security Options button in the Erase window, you can click that button to choose between a faster (but less secure) erase and a slower (but more secure) erase. Some older versions of Disk Utility offer the option to zero all data instead. These secure-erase options aren't offered or needed for solid-state drives (SSDs) and flash storage.
Not every USB drive can be used with a Mac out of the box, you'll need to format the drive to compatible with the MacOS extended file system. If you want to ensure full Mac compatibility on your USB drive or flash disk, just read this article. And you will find two ways which will teach you how to format a USB drive to FAT32 on Mac, including Disk Utility and Terminal command. And if you lost your important data because of formatting, you can use data recovery tool to recover data from a formatted USB drive on Mac.
What You Should Do First Before Formatting USB Drive on Mac
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The only way to be sure of the content you are formatting is to first remove the USB drive from Mac, know the title of other storage disks, insert the USB disk again and note the name of the disk. Now you are sure not to be formatting a wrong disk this way. Next, drag the USB data to a safe location for backup/recovery measures before formatting it. Then you are set to get it done!
Which File Format to Choose When Formatting USB Drive on Mac
For PCs operating on macOS High Sierra or newer version, you can select from two options of file formats: Mac OS Extended and APFS. Here is the difference, APFS format is not compatible with macOS versions older than High Sierra. Therefore, if you are sure to still insert your USB driver on older versions of macOS, then you should consider formatting as Mac OS Extended.
Also, if you are to use the USB drive as a destination for Time Machine, you should consider reformatting to Mac OS Extended as Time Machine cannot back up an APFS disk.
How to Format a USB Drive to FAT32 on Mac
As earlier stated, you need to first back up your USB drive before formatting the drive as you may not be able to recover the contents again. Now, you can follow the steps to be highlighted below to get it successfully formatted.
1Format a USB Drive to FAT32 in Mac OS with Disk Utility
Step 1. Insert the USB to be formatted to a Mac PC.
Step 2. Navigate to Applications > Utilities, and click it twice to open it.
Step 3. Select the drive you want to format and click on Erase.
Step 4. Rename the USB drive (optional), and choose the MS-DOS(FAT) for format.
Step 5. Then select Master Boot Record for scheme, hit Erase.
Step 6. Once the process is done, you are ready to reuse the drive with FAT32 file system to save data again.
2Convert/Format USB Drive to FAT32
Step 1. 3d vfx software. Connect the USB drive to your Mac PC.
Step 2. Click on cmd + space to run spotlight, input terminal then tap Enter key.
Step 3. Type diskutil list to find the location of your UB drive (eg: dev/disk2 is the USB drive in the below picture).
Step 4. Type sudo diskutil eraseDisk FAT32 MBRFormat /dev/disk2.
- sudo gives you user right.
- Diskutil calls disk utility program.
- eraseDisk commands to format.
- FAT32 sets the file system.
- MBRFormat tells disk utility to format with a Master Boot Record.
- /dev/disk2 is the location of the USB drive.
Format External Hard Drive Macbook Air
After the process completes, type diskutil list in command once more to check if the USB drive has been formatted successfully.
If succeeded, you can use the USB drive with FAT32 file system to store data again.
How to Recover Lost Data after Formatting a USB Drive to FAT32 on Mac
Can't See External Hard Drive
Users perhaps format a USB drive by mistake. Only after formatting it, they would realize that they had lost important data. If you don' t have a backup for data, then you can recover lost data from formatted USB drive on Mac with this trusted data recovery software - iMyFone AnyRecover. You can now recover all kinds of data from formatted USB drive on Mac with only 3 simple steps.
Features of iMyFone AnyRecover:
- Your Comprehensive Mac Data Recovery Solution
You can get back your lost photos, videos, documents, compressed files, and numerous kinds of data from formatted USB drive easily.
Retrieve data from MacBook, any internal or external storage media: memory card, USB drive, virtual disk, HDD, SSD, and so on.
Resolve all data loss situations: formatted drive, trash emptied, partition lost, accidental deletion, virus attack, hardware failure and other cases.
It allows you to preview scanned files before recovery and select what you want to restore.
Format External Hard Drive Mac
It supports data recovery on all types of USB drives. It also supports file formats like NTFS, HFS, FAT, exFAT, etc.
Follow the next steps to recover data after formatting USB flash drive on mac:
Gimp application software. Step 1: Make sure you have connected your USB drive to your Mac successfully. Launch AnyRecover software on your system and select the formatted USB drive you are trying to recover from. And press the “Start” button to start the scanning.
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Step 2: The software will automatically begin the scanning process. This can help you recover your lost data from your formatted USB drive.
Step 3: Immediately after the scanning process is complete, the software will list all the files in their respective file formats and folders. Tick on and confirm what you are going to recover, then click on “Recover” button.
Conclusion
Format External Drive Windows 10
USB storage devices have become very popular these days because they are a very convenient way to store and transfer data. However, there could be times when you formatted disk, accidentally deleted files, your storage device could become damaged, or you could end up with data corruption due to operating system failures, viruses, software malfunctions or other problems that cause damage to your data stored on your USB storage device. If it is the case, do not panic, Just download iMyFone AnyRecover to get your lost data back quickly and easily.