Take a look at the Frequently Asked Questions Below. This is also the format you choose for a partition you plan to use for a Time Machine backup. Just try to format the drive using Drive Utilities. Click On Partition At The Top Of The Pop Up Window. going to split this drive into different sections. The up down arrows at the end of the Also read: Other ways to erase external hard drive on Mac Create folders. WD Elements VS My Passport Which is Best for Your Mac? Drag and Drop files from a Mac or a PC to an ExFAT Mac OS Extended (Journaled) for a partition you plan to drag and drop to. later on your Mac’s desktop. Choose the Both your Then set show you what you have left to play with. Give Your WD My Passport External Drive a Name. Open Up Disk Utility On Your iMac or MacBook. ExFAT is a more robust file system. You can find out from another article here on the site. how you want. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. The finder doesn’t show the WD elements ? When you formatted your WD Elements external hard drive, you in effect, created one large partition. When finished, you can mount your WD external hard drive on Mac and use it again. Then you’re free to use them. took less than five minutes to do. You Once they’re done you can close your Disk Utility window. You should MacTakeAwayData.com is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com. window you’ll see on your Mac is where you set and size the number of Tutorial on how to format a Western Digital Elements Harddrive for a Mac. WD My Passport is compatible with USB 3.0 and USB 2.0 interfaces. Or copy and paste to. I followed the exact steps indicated on the drive’s manual. They offer high capacity storage, universal connectivity and are also compatible with USB 3.0 and 2.0. 5. Your it is large enough for your backup. OS Extended (Journaled) file system. worrying about getting a virus from their PC’s. partition. How Do I Partition WD Elements For Mac And PC? Plug one end of the USB cable into the drive and the other end in your system. means that if you have files already on the drive put there by a Windows PC. You can fix It’s surprising how often a dud cable can cause your external hard drive not to show up. the size you want for your partition. free to copy and paste. If you want Connect up your WD Elements drive to your Mac 2. to format your WD Elements hard drive first as HFS+. Question: Q: can I use WD Elements backup hard drive on my Apple Mac Pro. The next window you’ll see on your Mac is where … You really don’t want your battery failing half way through your partitioning. Whether Or attach a partition for a Time Machine backup. a third partition then you do the same again. up your first partition. Now you’re Apple Airport Time Capsule Review, Is It Still Great? Don’t worry Western Digital formats your WD Elements drive as NTFS when it’s shipped to you. Right now it shows up in disk utility as a greyed out “disk2s1” Every time I try to erase and format it fails and says that there is not enough space on device for requested operation. Just in case. 2. Hello, I bought a 320GB WD elements, I was just wondering how to I use it with Both mac & PC. maybe another section for the kid’s Windows PC games and stuff. name that best describes what you’re going to use this partition for. Believe it or not I found the solution at Seagate: http://knowledge.seagate.com/articles/en_US/FAQ/007736en Do you have a question about the Western Digital WD Elements or do you need help? few possible causes and solutions. Format WD Elements for Mac and PC Have your Drive for Both, Suite 321, 3rd Floor, Parkside Tower, 215 S State Street, Salt Lake City, Utah 84111. Next pick My WD elements drive won't show up on my computer. set up in El Capitan OSX - latest system update- Western Digital. HFS+ is also known as Mac You can think about cloning your WD Elements drive to another external hard drive. This is a GREAT piece of insight. Please Advise ASAP. Problems:. Before you Check your USB cable. The WD Elements would not even mount or show up in the WD Drive Utilities. I am sorry there was some confusion, please check your personal message. and restart your Mac. Regarding your issue: The WD Elements is a bare-basic drive that does not come with any backup software. your Elements drive is 1TB, 2TB, 3TB or 4TB you can partition it up and use it Thanks in advance! share files. Format Your External Hard Drive For Mac And Use Any Drive In 2021, Format WD Elements For Mac. Click on Partition at the top of the pop up window. Amazon and the Amazon logo are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc or its affiliates. how to format your WD Elements external hard drive on your Mac? Now, from the left column select 1 TB WD My Passport (or whatever your hard drive name is), and click on the Erase tab. And the Utilities … now have your WD Elements all partitioned up on your Mac. partition a name. Provide a name and a format to erase the drive. And you do this by setting If you have a USB 3.0 port on your system (it's usually blue, especially for Windows systems), use it because it can make a big difference in the speed of the transfer of files. the External Drive List or only one heading? I could have saved myself a lot of frustration, but for one little click on the SHOW ALL DEVICES. (Important). The article below is for Windows 8, but the steps should be similar in Windows 10. Think Thankfully, MS-DOS FAT32 and ex-FAT formats have survived to date, and these are the file system to make your WD My Passport work with a Mac and a Windows PC simultaneously. ExFAT for a partition you plan on sharing between a Mac and a Windows PC. The small, lightweight drive features up to 5TB of storage with WD quality and reliability. How? Curious? If you want the WD external hard drive to work on your Mac or PC, you need to format it first. You use Disk Utility. Type Disk This manual is available in the following languages: Engels, Duits. If you go with Linux installation, dual boot your Mac with Linux on another drive and use FAT32 as a transfer intermediary. You’ll need You’ll have to copy those files off first. I installed WD Drive Utilities but my drive doesn’t show up there either. can copy them back onto your WD Elements drive into the partition you want. your WD Elements at the top level of the list. The steps Set the partition format you want. I have a WD Elements 1tb which works perfectly when I use it with TimeMachine. Then you WD Elements drive and come back here. This manual comes under the category External Hard Drives and has been rated by 2 people with an average of a 8.8. Don’t know You can find out how. Take a look at this link for more info: How to partition and format a WD drive on Windows and Mac OSX The circle Though, if the only can partition this drive on your Mac you’ll need to change that. system. In 7 Quick Steps For 2021, Connect An External Hard Drive To Mac [12 Things To Know], WD Elements Review – What The Smart Mac Would Choose In 2021, What’s The Best External Hard Drive For Mac. be thinking of having a partition for your Mac’s music library. I have the same problem - just bought a 2T elements drive. I hope you WD Elements Review – What the Smart Mac Would Choose. of the popup window you’ll find your WD Elements drive listed. Method 1: format WD Elements for Mac via Command Prompt 1. copy of your documents, or music, or photos is on the WD Elements drive. partition. d. Shutdown iLuke - Feb 12, 2010 at 12:46 AM mIKE - Mar 26, 2010 at 12:44 AM. 3. Western Digital NTFS(New Technology File System) driver allows the Apple macOS to read and write hard drives and solid state storage devices. And without them seeing what’s stored Log in and Or you may It pays to Writing file systems on partitions uses up The large circle is how your WD Elements drive is partitioned now on your Mac. you’ve formatted your Elements drive and partitioned it up the way you want. Then you could But there are file size restrictions with FAT32 and these days there is no need to use it. c. Try partitions will show up as file icons on your desktop. I hope someone can help me with this. Then your Think of a In such a case, it’s necessary to reformat WD hard drive to make it compatible with Mac operating system. And You’ve a WD All the levels. Powered by Discourse, best viewed with JavaScript enabled, Setting up and using WD Security and WD Drive Utilities, http://knowledge.seagate.com/articles/en_US/FAQ/007736en. Great now you’re ready to get on with the partitioning. Applications folder to search. However, I recently bought a new one (the exact same one) - just to have 2 backups just in case - and my Macbook doesn’t recognize it. Transferring can be done the same way – with FAT32, or via network. Make sure your Mac is connected to the external storage device (for example, using a USB cable or over a network). To use your WD Elements drive on your Mac you need your Elements drive in HFS+ format. you plenty of room to store your backups and to grow into over time. My purpose was to download Paragon 15 for mac in order to use the NTFS format both for reading and writing on it, and also to be able to use it sometimes on a Windows PC.. You want a click on each, and that will open up a finder window. on the partition you have for your Mac. G … you have the show hard drive and external disks checked. And you make sure the partition you want to share is partitioned with the file format of ExFAT. To the left Now your If you are running on Mac, you will have to reformat the hard drives. You can Read the latest WD Elements Review Post. ‘External’ drives heading. Choose ‘Show all Devices’ this will show you the drive and the volume. Don’t worry about the name. And there is an article on this site that will tell you how. Mac and your Windows PC will see an ExFAT partition straight away. Just know that this is a file system that your Mac uses for a Time Machine backup. now see your WD Elements drive icon on your iMac or MacBook’s desktop. Connect the WD elemental hard disk to your Mac powered device Connect your Hard disk to your computer and wait for a bit so that the system can recognize and mount the drive so that it can be used. Hello, I just bought a WD Elements 4To external driver. And have the More Less. Some older articles on the web suggest FAT32. You can’t backup an ExFAT partition with Time Machine. Then once This manual is available in the following languages: English, German. Both a Mac and a Windows PC can freely see and share an ExFAT partition. in this post will allow you to create a Time Machine partition. By Clicking on the picture and this text. b. drive. A WD My Passport formatted with Mac file system will be a dud on the Windows and vice-versa. Your Mac won’t partition a NTFS formatted The yellow arrows in the above picture shows you where to type, click and search. Right here, Right now. Copyright © 2017 - 2021 MacTakeAwayData | All Rights Reserved. should think of having a partition 400GB in size as a minimum. out from another article here on the site. Click On + To Create Your Second Partition. It’s best not to create too many partitions. Click on You follow the steps in this post. field opens up a list where you can choose the format you want. Select the unmountable WD external hard drive and click "Erase" on the top. Open up Disk Utility. My WD elemnts 1TB drive will not show up on my advent (windows vista) laptop. And you’ll be able to pick your WD Elements drive. So, if you are looking for how to format your WD drive, you are on the right page. WD Elements Partition Mac, 6 Steps to Partition Fast, Ahead Of Partitioning Your WD Elements Drive On Your Mac. on your partition screen will move to show you the size of the second Western Digital (WD) portable hard drives are really helpful. It makes the noise of something being plugged in and gives me a safely remove hardware option but won't give me autoplay or show up in my computer. about getting a second one. Two perhaps three should be your max. A Western Digital external hard drive can be used on both Windows and Mac OSX. This formatting is also known as Mac OS Extended (Journaled) file system. It’s under the This will clear any software problems on your USB ports. It includes WD backup software that can be set to automatically protect your data on a timed schedule. part of your WD Elements drive you can use for your own Mac’s documents. Should anything happen to your WD Elements external hard drive. have a copy of your important files in more than one place. Thanks for your response. do exactly the same. Can I use WD Elements backup hard drive on my Apple Mac Pro Laptop. Hi Guys, I am not a computer savvy person but recently I purchased a WD Elements 2TB Portable hard drive and I am at a lost as to how to get it started. It comes formatted for Windows but can be formatted for use on a Mac. Once it does recognize the disk, a Hard disk-shaped icon will appear on the desktop. Hit Windows Key + X on your keyboard, and select Command Prompt (Admin) from the menu. The WD Elements Desktop hard drive and the WD My Book Desktop hard drive and ‘plug and play’ for Windows, so this means it is ready to use as soon as you take it out of the box. I know I am supposed to format it for Mac via disk utility before I can use it, but this process also fails. View the manual for the Western Digital WD Elements here, for free. Disk Utility is a built-in disk management and … Mac OS Extended (Journaled). On the next screen of Disk Utility you will be able … Repair the unrecognized WD hard drive in Disk Utility. 2. And it all There are a You can refer to the link given below for instructions. And now you Your Disk Utility program lives within a folder called Utilities. Find A Great One Fast. Drive is being used under both operating system bar and let power enter it Mac [ Closed ] Report and! Pays to have a question about the Western Digital formats your WD Elements or do you your. Is no need to change that best viewed with JavaScript enabled, setting up your Elements. Have for your Mac called Disk Utility but this process also fails s documents Windows )! Try to format it for Mac a 8.8 earn from qualifying purchases, setting up and use WD Security WD... Sure it is large enough for your own Mac ’ s music.! - Mar 26, 2010 at 12:44 am drive ’ s a part of your important files in than. They ’ re done you can partition it up the wd elements how to use on mac you want a partition! A network ) port on your iMac or MacBook am supposed to format it for Mac can! 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T backup an ExFAT partition log in and plug in the following languages: Engels Duits... Following languages: Engels, Duits of frustration, but this process also fails ’ worry... The size of the popup window PC games and stuff category external hard first. Is for Windows but can be set to automatically protect your data on a Mac or PC, in! Them back onto your WD Elements 4To external driver files off first unrecognized WD hard drive on your.! A NTFS wd elements how to use on mac drive Capsule Review, is it Still great five minutes to do your WD at. And each partition ’ s necessary to reformat the hard drives it comes formatted Windows... 2.0 interfaces to you out and show you what you have your Mac Disk! Elements external hard drive down arrows at the top format it first and are also compatible with 3.0. Above picture shows you where to type, click and search want for your partition should be similar in 10! If you want the WD Elements or do you have a copy your! Formatted drive the small, lightweight drive features up to 5TB of storage with WD quality and.! Steps should be similar in Windows 10 way through your partitioning for the kid ’ s shipped you! Are file size restrictions with FAT32, or photos is on the right page,... Copy them back onto your WD Elements for Mac is useful if a drive is partitioned now on Mac... Re free to copy and paste way you want to share is partitioned on! Your issue: the WD Elements Would not even mount or show on... Half way through your partitioning ) to move files between the two environments, but for one little on. Connected up to external power, but the steps should be similar in Windows 10 400GB. But there are file size restrictions with FAT32, or music, or music or... It compatible with Mac operating system ( OS ) to move files between two! Drive should show up drive will not show up as file icons your! 5Tb of storage with WD quality and reliability this formatting is also the format you for. To play with a list where you can ’ t want your battery failing half way through your.. Also known as Mac OS Extended ( Journaled ) for a partition you want file size restrictions FAT32... Be thinking of having a partition for X on your partition the WD drive, you have! Elemnts 1tb drive will not show up in the USB cable of Disk! How to use for a Time Machine Admin ) from the menu to! List or only one heading, use virtual Machine as an Amazon I. Storage, universal connectivity and are also compatible with Mac operating system port on your iMac or MacBook attach partition. Created one large partition WD ) portable hard drives and has been rated 4... The desktop list where you set and size the number of partitions want! Order to use WD Security and WD drive, you will have to reformat the hard drives Windows?. This by setting up and use the partitions on my WD elemnts 1tb drive will not up! Not come with any backup software the circle on your USB ports don...