Mac compatability with PC

[bhar.suman]

I wist to buy a Macbook Air soon. But if I wist to use a pen drive or an external drive, can I do this both in Mac and also in PC? Is there any comparability issue?

 

[aroraanant]

No issues in using a pen drive.
But there are some issues with external drive.You will be able to read the existing stuff but won't be able to modify it, though you can add stuff into it.I tried changing the privileges but that didn't work,there must be something that one can do but I haven't searched for that as I m busy these,will do in a few days n will let you know or someone else can help you with that.But the latest HDD which are coming now days, I have read that they are totally compatible and the issue have been resolved.

 

[bhar.suman]

Thank you for your reply. Yesterday I visited Apple's iStore in Kolkata. There I put the same question to the sales representative. He answered me that I will not be able to swap an external hard drive between Mac and a PC.

 

[aaruni]

That is wrong. I have an old 40GB external hard disk which i use to transfer data between my two laptops (Macbook 5.1 and Dell Inspiron N5010). The only thing was that I had to format it with disk utility using FAT format.

 

[kbar1]

Technically, you can enable NTFS support in Snow Leopard by some terminal jugglery. Read here: [macworld.com].

But there might be a reason why Apple left it disabled by default. There are reliable third-party tools. Like this one: NTFS for Mac: [paragon-software.com].

Edit: Here's another tool: [ntfsmounter.com].

 

[red dragon]

Just format the ext drive in FAT,you are good to go.
I am using 3/4 portable hdd between a couple of Macs and the lone p.c.