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Make it FAT32 or exFAT. Then it should be compatible both ways. <br />
If you format it in NTFS then you would need a driver which allows the full read/write support on MacOSX. <br />
Like this one: <a href="http://www.paragon-software.com/home/ntfs-mac/download.html" rel="ugc">http://www.paragon-software.com/home/ntfs-mac/download.html</a><br />
NTFS is better than FAT32 in view of security.
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All, the size of the External HDD is 3TB. Will that matter which File System to use? It will be a single drive, no partitions will be created.
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Use ExFAT if you're going to take it to other systems and need access from both Macs and Windows systems.<br />
<br />
On your own systems, you should either use NTFS or HFS+, depending on which one you use more often. &nbsp;If it's about equally often, I would use NTFS. &nbsp;There are free tools to read and write NTFS on a Mac and there are free tools on Windows to read and write HFS+.
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Hello Experts,<br />
<br />
I have a Mac and PC. I would like to format an external HDD that I can read/write on both platforms. Which file system should I format the external HDD in? Should I use NTFS, Fat16, Fat32 or exFat? Please explain why as well.<br />
<br />
Thanks in advance!
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Hello Experts,

I have a Mac and PC. I would like to format an external HDD that I can read/write on both platforms. Which file system should I format the external HDD in? Should I use NTFS, Fat16, Fat32 or exFat? Please explain why as well.

Thanks in advance!

File System

Mac OS X is the desktop operating system from Apple Inc., found on Macintosh computers. OS X consists of a Mach/BSD-based kernel, operating system interfaces primarily based on FreeBSD and additional frameworks (written in C, C++ and Objective-C providing user interface and application-level services.

Mac OS X

This topic area includes legacy versions of Windows prior to Windows 2000: Windows 3/3.1, Windows 95 and Windows 98, plus any other Windows-related versions including Windows Mobile.

Windows OS

Storage devices include any device used for storing and retrieving digital information. Hard disk drives (HDDs) use one or more rigid ("hard") rapidly rotating disks (platters) coated with magnetic material. Data is accessed in a random-access manner, meaning that individual blocks of data can be stored or retrieved in any order and not only sequentially. The primary competing technology for secondary storage is flash memory in the form of solid-state drives (SSDs), but HDDs remain the dominant medium for secondary storage due to advantages in price per bit and per-device recording capacity. CD-RW (Compact Disc-ReWritable) is a digital optical disc storage format that allows information to be stored outside the mechanical HDD.