external hard drive

[Rottie]

I have so much to learn about Apple OSX...how come I can't move files to NTFS harddrive??? USB Flash drive does not work either.

 

[kamikazekyle]

Grab NTFS-3G for full write compatability. There's a paid version that's faster I think, but for your average external the free version is fine.
http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/system_disk_utilities/ntfs3g.html

As for the flash drive, it was probably formatted into NTFS as well. If the drive isn't showing up at all, there might be something wonky with the partition table or something. OSX can natively read modern NTFS file systems, just not write without an extra driver. FAT read/write support is native, however.

 

[TheStu]

kamikazekyle nailed it. However, if you ware willing to spend the money, check out Paragon NTFS. Last I used it, NTFS-3G/MacFUSE only gave you half speed read/writes. Paragon's are full speed, but it does cost $40 IIRC.

For jump drives that you will be moving from a PC to a Mac, and vice versa, use FAT32. BUt since that has a 4GB file size limit, it isn't the best idea for large amounts of storage.

 

[Exirion]

Actually you don't need to buy any additional software. Snow Leopard already has full NTFS support, but write support is disabled by default. You can enable it pretty easily:

http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=186460

 

[ChAoTiCpInOy]

Actually you don't need to buy any additional software. Snow Leopard already has full NTFS support, but write support is disabled by default. You can enable it pretty easily:

http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=186460

I've had problems with this. It corrupted my Windows 7 partition.

 

[TheStu]

I've had problems with this. It corrupted my Windows 7 partition.

Never had that, but have heard of it.

Actually you don't need to buy any additional software. Snow Leopard already has full NTFS support, but write support is disabled by default. You can enable it pretty easily:

http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=186460

It is an unsupported feature, and if it was ready for the prime-time then they would have not hidden it away.

 

[Exirion]

I've had problems with this. It corrupted my Windows 7 partition.

Sorry to hear that.

It is an unsupported feature, and if it was ready for the prime-time then they would have not hidden it away.

Well, there could be others reasons for not enabling it. Avoiding that people try to install OSX on NTFS filesystems for instance Not necessarily reliability issues.

 

[alfa147x]

I've had problems with this. It corrupted my Windows 7 partition.

Same here :\

 

[TheStu]

Sorry to hear that.


Well, there could be others reasons for not enabling it. Avoiding that people try to install OSX on NTFS filesystems for instance Not necessarily reliability issues.

It would just produce an error and kick them back to the beginning. If that was the concern then they wouldn't include support for FAT32.

Pretty sure that instability, file corruption, and the fact that it isn't finished is reason enough.