Content

• Steps
• Advice
• Warning

This wikiHow teaches you how to select, connect and format an external hard drive on a Windows or Mac computer.

Steps

Part 1 of 3: Choosing external hard drive

1. 

   . Click the File Explorer app with a folder icon at the bottom of your desktop.
   • If you don't see the File Explorer app icon, tap ⊞ Win+E to open File Explorer.

2. 

   
   
   . Click the Spotlight app with the magnifying glass icon in the top right corner of the screen.

3. 

   Open Disk Utility. Import disk utility then double click Disk Utility when the option appears in the search results. The Disk Utility window will pop up.

4. 

   
   
   Select external hard drive. In the upper left of the Disk Utility window, click the name of your external hard drive.

5. 

   Click the card Erase at the top of the Disk Utility window. A window will pop up.

6. 

   
   
   Click the "Format" drop-down box in the middle of the pop-up window.

7. 

   Select the file system. Click one of the following options:
   • Mac OS Extended (Journaled) Choose this option if you only want to use the external hard drive on your Mac.
   • ExFAT Choose this option if you want to use an external hard drive on both Windows and Mac computers.

8. 

   Click Erase (Delete) is at the bottom of the window.

9. 

   Click Erase when prompted. The Mac will begin to format the drive. After formatting is complete, you can continue to use the drive as you wish. advertisement

Advice

• Many other devices (other than computers) that allow adding external hard drives (such as game consoles) will provide the format in the Storage section of the Settings menu.
• Don't forget to safely disconnect the external hard drive before unplugging the cable from the computer. This action is to ensure that data on the hard drive is saved.

Warning

• Not all file systems are compatible with all computers. If you choose to use a proprietary file system (for example: NTFS for Windows) you will get an error when you try to add this external hard drive to a computer running another operating system.
• Formatting will erase all of the content on the drive.