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Format Flash Drive For Use On Mac And Pc

WARNING: Formatting will erase all data on the device. Back up all your data before proceeding.

  1. Format Flash Drive For Use On Mac And Pc Computer
  2. Mac Flash Drive To Pc
  3. Format Usb For Mac And Pc
  4. Format Flash Drive For Mac And Pc 2018

Format Flash Drive For Use On Mac And Pc Computer

Instructions below are for 10.11.x (El Capitan) and 10.12.x (Sierra)

If you're moving it between Mac and Windows, you want to format your flash drive with the FAT32 filesystem. It shouldn't matter whether you format it on your Mac or on a Windows machine. To do it on the Mac, plug in the flash drive, and open Disk Utility (in your /Applications/Utilities folder). Attach the drive to your Mac. Launch Disk Utility (from Applications Utilities Disk Utility). Select the drive in the left-hand sidebar. From the Format menu, select ExFAT. To format your external drive hard drive in Windows to use on Mac and PC platforms, first plug-in your drive with a Windows machine. Open the Disk Management tool by right-clicking on the start menu icon and then select Disk Management.

1. Double-click on Macintosh HD - or in the Finder menu clickFile > New Finder Window
2. Click the Applications folder - if using a Finder Window Applicationswill be in the left side menu.
3. Click the Utilities folder.
4. Double-click Disk Utility.
5. On the left side of the window are the drives connected to the computer. Select the capacity of the drive respective to the one containing the device you wish to format then click the Erase tab.
Example: If the drive is called 'NO NAME', directly above that, you should see the drive capacity of 'XXXX'. Select this capacity.
6. Verify Volume Format is set to MS-DOS file system or exFAT, Scheme is set to “Master Boot Record” (Do NOT select GUID Partition Map) then click Erase.

Instructions below are for 10.13.x (High Sierra)

1. Open Disk Utility. Please See Answer 20985: How to access Disk Utility macOS
2. In the top menu bar, go to View, and choose Show All Devices


3. Select the upper level of the drive you would like to format and click the Erase button


4. Choose how you would like to format the drive

  • Enter a Name for your drive
  • Choose exFAT or MS-DOS (FAT) for the format
  • Choose Master Boot Record for the Scheme
  • Click Erase

5. When finished, the drive will be formatted and repartitioned successfully. Click the Done button

NOTE: exFAT is used on SDXC card (64GB and higher).

NOTE: exFAT can be used on flash drives or memory cards to transfer files larger than 4GB.

Mac Flash Drive To Pc

NOTE: MacOS 10.6.2 or higher is required for exFAT file system. Some older operating systems must have a patch installed before they can use the exFAT file system.

Format flash drive for mac

Format Usb For Mac And Pc

NOTE: If the above steps do NOT resolve the problem or if the lock switch is missing or broken, please back up your data and request a replacement using our online web form.


Format Flash Drive For Mac And Pc 2018

Related Articles:
Operating systems that support exFAT
Deleting files on a memory card using a Mac
Deleting files on a Cruzer USB flash drive using a Mac

If you're moving it between Mac and Windows, you want to format your flash drive with the FAT32 filesystem. It shouldn't matter whether you format it on your Mac or on a Windows machine.
To do it on the Mac, plug in the flash drive, and open Disk Utility (in your /Applications/Utilities folder). The drive should appear in the list on the left of the DU window.
Select the drive, then click the Erase tab. On that tab, select MS-DOS (FAT) as the volume format, choose a disk name if you want to, then click Erase, and wait.
That said, if your drive just 'didn't work any more' after a while, it may be faulty and it's possible that re-formatting it won't help. (All flash drives do have a finite number of read/write cycles before they don't work reliably any more, too, although it's unlikely you've reached that limit through normal usage.)

Aug 23, 2008 1:22 PM