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    HDD for Time Machine - can WinXP use it?

    Discussion in 'Apple and Mac OS X' started by lanwarrior, Nov 2, 2008.

  1. lanwarrior

    lanwarrior Notebook Evangelist

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    If I have a 500GB external USB drive and I use it with Time Machine, will my other WinXP machine be able to use the drive and copy files to it?

    Example:
    - Time Machine create folder called "abc" and use it for that purpose
    - WinXP can create another folder called "win" and copy Windows files to it
    - USB drive is an NTFS drive, which Mac can read (I believe?)

    ...OR....

    Do I have to partition the drive so that 50% is Mac HSF while the rest is NTFS?
     
    lanwarrior, Nov 2, 2008
    #1
  2. lanwarrior

    lanwarrior Notebook Evangelist

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    ...OR... (this maybe a long stretch):

    I have a 1 TB external drive that is NOT portable. If I hook this up to a WinXP machine (my server at home) and share a folder that is accessible by my MacBook Pro, will Time Machine be able to backup to that folder?
     
    lanwarrior, Nov 2, 2008
    #2
  3. lee_what2004

    lee_what2004 Wee...

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    AFAIK, mac can read-only NTFS, so you need to make it to FAT32 if you want to share between mac and windows, this if you want windows to be able to access folder abc.
    if not 50% is Mac HSF while the rest is NTFS, will work well also, only leaving windows can't access mac partition and mac can only read file in windows.

    IINM, there's program for mac to be able to read and write on NTFS though.
     
    lee_what2004, Nov 2, 2008
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  4. Denludi

    Denludi Notebook Enthusiast

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    Yes, 3G ntfs or paragon are programs for mac to write ntfs, but even with one of those installed you're time machine cannot back-up on an ntfs partition. The harddrive doesn't show up in the time machine program...
     
    Denludi, Nov 2, 2008
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  5. Budding

    Budding Notebook Virtuoso

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    You can just format your entire HD into HFS+, and then access it in Windows using MacDrive or MacFUSE. Of course partitioning is another option, although you will have to do it using Disk Utility in OS X.
     
    Budding, Nov 2, 2008
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  6. chen

    chen Notebook Deity

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    FAT32 format should do it unless you are using VISTA
     
    chen, Nov 2, 2008
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  7. lanwarrior

    lanwarrior Notebook Evangelist

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    Ah, so there goes the theory of sharing the NTFS partition for both Windows XP and Time Machine. I use NTFS in all my Windows installation because I have files that are larger than 4GB (VMWare, etc.).

    So it looks like the BEST solution is to partition the external hard drive as follow:

    1) Connect the HDD to Mac and using DiskUtility, partition half of the size to HSF+. Windows will NOT be able to see this partition
    2) Connect the HDD to PC and partition the rest to NTFS. Windows will see the
    hard drive as "unformat" partition with half the size.


    Speaking of NTFS, can Mac NATIVELY read a shared folder in NTFS from a Windows machine?

    The reason is because I am making my MacBook as my primary machine and moving my iTunes library to the Mac. In the current setup in WinXP machine, some of the songs/video are added to iTunes via mapped network drive. So the songs/video reside in a remote hard drive but still added (and sync) to my iPhone. So in my MacBook, I have to map the Windows drive (again, in NTFS) and add the song as the current setup.
     
    lanwarrior, Nov 2, 2008
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  8. grahamnp

    grahamnp Notebook Enthusiast

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    OSX can read NTFS but it can't write to it by default, you will need something like NTFS-3G for that.

    Note that in FAT32 you won't be able to write files larger than 4gb.
     
    grahamnp, Nov 2, 2008
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  9. circa86

    circa86 Notebook Virtuoso NBR Reviewer

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    i recommend just formatting everything for the Mac and using MacDrive on your PC or PC's, definitely worth the ease.
     
    circa86, Nov 2, 2008
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  10. lanwarrior

    lanwarrior Notebook Evangelist

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    SO that means my iTunes situation above should be no problem, right? I mean, iTunes in the Mac will just "read" the songs from the remote drive (in Windows XP) and copy it to the iPhone. AFAIK, nothing is copied to the iTunes locally (I searched).
     
    lanwarrior, Nov 2, 2008
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  11. lanwarrior

    lanwarrior Notebook Evangelist

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    OK, this is interesting: I have an external USB HDD that is physically connected to a Windows Vista machine and the partition in that USB HDD is NTFS. The drive is shared (network mapping) and I can connect to it from my MacBook Pro. I copy a file FROM the MacBook TO the shared folder (NTFS) and it work. So it seems to be able to WRITE to NTFS folder.
     
    lanwarrior, Nov 5, 2008
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  12. lee_what2004

    lee_what2004 Wee...

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    this is interesting :D

    how bout tried to copy directly from MacBook Pro to the USB HDD connected by usb?

    found some hint :D
    http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=171765
    look at post #8

    and still, OSX can't WRITE on NTFS :D
    unless by 3rd party help
     
    lee_what2004, Nov 5, 2008
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  13. Budding

    Budding Notebook Virtuoso

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    If you write to a device via a network protocol then the target you write to becomes a node on the network which will allow you to read/write data to/from regardless of its file system. This is different from the USB interface, which uses a different type of protocol.
     
    Budding, Nov 5, 2008
    #13