format usb drive for windows and mac?

[MuGeN]

how in the hell do you do this? i formatted it to MS-DOS in disk utility but in windows it shows up either not at all or as a poxy 200mb drive...

in computer management > disk management on the pc you can see the extra x amount of gigs on the removable device but can't do anything with it the only usable thing is the crappy 200mb partition...

if i put it back in the mac, it screws up and needs formatting but is then restored back to working order but only for the mac

so, how do i turn this into an 8gb, cross platform memory stick? and if this isn't possible, how do i simply make it a windows one?

 

[Makhaira]

Just format as FAT32 and you'll be fine.

 

[MuGeN]

fraid not, no idea why though...

it happens like this:

1) format to MS-DOS FAT32 on OS X
2) put into Windows
3) in disk management it looks like the properly formatted disk is there, but there is another partition called "GPT Protective Partition", as far as windows is concerned this is the only thing that can be formatted or used and its only 200mb...

i even tried using DiskPart from a DOS prompt and using the clean command which zeros all sectors, this then makes it unusable and even unformattable in windows

pop it back in the mac, format it and all is fine again...

as far as i can see, once you format something on the mac you willl never get it to be usable in windows again... surely this isn't the case?

 

[Rich]

I use NTFS and the NTFS-3G for OSX

http://macntfs-3g.blogspot.com/

I store some pretty large images for VMWARE etc on the drive so NTFS seems the best option.

 

[MuGeN]

christ, finally worked it out - you do have to use DiskPart and clean the partition, then you have to use disk management to create a new partition and it all works fine...

jeez!

 

[Fillado]

...as far as i can see, once you format something on the mac you willl never get it to be usable in windows again... surely this isn't the case?

That's because you formatted it using a GPT partition scheme not MBR

In Disk Utility while in the partitions tab there is a button called "Options" that lets you choose.

Everything from Windows XP 64-bit forwards is meant to support GPT.

 

[MuGeN]

your kidding... how on earth are people meant to know about that little gem of information?

 

[PeterNem]

Google?

 

[Fillado]

I'm pretty certain Disk Utility always honours the current partition scheme of the drive...