Windows 7 won't recognize my External Hard Drive

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TehPoTayToh

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I'm trying to do a backup for my PC but Windows 7 wont read it. The Drive and cable worked fine when I used it on a Mac Book, and the USB Ports for my PC also work fine when other things are plugged into them.
 
Solution
casper1973
Did you format the drive on your Mac? If so, do you know what file-system you chose?

Macs use a file-system called HFS+ (or Mac OS Extended) which Windows cannot understand without third-party tools.
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casper1973

casper1973

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Did you format the drive on your Mac? If so, do you know what file-system you chose?

Macs use a file-system called HFS+ (or Mac OS Extended) which Windows cannot understand without third-party tools.
 
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Solution
photonboy

photonboy

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Jun 20, 2006
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Yep.

Windows won't read it formatted in the OSX file system. If you had formatted as NTFS with Windows first then I believe it could be read by your MAC but you couldn't write anything to it with your Mac.

I'm no expert, and there may be some 3rd party software to help but my understanding is it's a big pain so maybe get a separate internal drive for your PC (or USB if no space but they're more expensive).

You can get a 3.5", 1TB HDD for only $50 plus tax/shipping:
http://pcpartpicker.com/part/seagate-internal-hard-drive-st1000dm003
 
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photonboy

photonboy

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I'm no expert, but that doesn't quite make sense to me unless it was re-formatted on the Mac.

If it was formatted on a PC before it should still be usable on PC.
 
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casper1973

casper1973

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TimeMachine backups are only compatible with HFS+ volumes so the drive must have been formatted again when the backup was configured. Might have been done automatically and OP didn't realise.

PS.
Glad to see you got it all working :)
 
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