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    Will Leopard READ and WRITE to NTFS

    Discussion in 'Apple and Mac OS X' started by smiley_lauf, Sep 22, 2007.

  1. smiley_lauf

    smiley_lauf Notebook Consultant

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    in bootcamp installed Windows XP/Vista? If it does then there would not be a need to have a third bridging partition (FAT32) to share data between OS X and Windows? Correct?

    Thanks

    S
     
    smiley_lauf, Sep 22, 2007
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  2. coocooforcocoapuffs

    coocooforcocoapuffs Newbie

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    i cant really parse that sentance smiley, but i have a mbp and it reads and writes to a windows server with ntfs disks just fine? is that what u mean? or are u wondering about when in virtual mode? i don't think u need anything other then bootcamp and something like parallels. cheers!
     
    coocooforcocoapuffs, Sep 22, 2007
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  3. smiley_lauf

    smiley_lauf Notebook Consultant

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    coocoo, sorry for be so vague. I was refering to the dual booting using bootcamp on same machine: WinXp/Vista will be in NTFS format. I know Tiger reads NTFS and not write, but will Leopard be able to write to this partition? I also know that currently Tiger CAN write to NTFS ONLY if the NTFS drive on the network--much like what you have up there.
     
    smiley_lauf, Sep 22, 2007
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  4. Budding

    Budding Notebook Virtuoso

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    Leopard will not natively support NTFS write, but there are apps that you can install that will allow that, like the NTFS-3G project, which also works in Tiger.
     
    Budding, Sep 22, 2007
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  5. Filippo 9800pro

    Filippo 9800pro Notebook Enthusiast

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    Filippo 9800pro, Sep 22, 2007
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  6. smiley_lauf

    smiley_lauf Notebook Consultant

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    Thank you all; yes, I have heard of MacFUSE and NTFS-3G projects.--this is next best thing; but Budding answered the question succintly.
     
    smiley_lauf, Sep 22, 2007
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  7. Zedr0n

    Zedr0n Notebook Consultant

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    The only problem with ntfs-3g it writes/reads to my usb2 external drive at usb1 speed while os x can natively read at usb2 speed. Haven't found the solution yet
     
    Zedr0n, Sep 22, 2007
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  8. Filippo 9800pro

    Filippo 9800pro Notebook Enthusiast

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    No osx version can write on ntfs (leopard included), you can do it by network places because in this case isn't osx that write in the partition, but the os that accommodate it...

    Seamlessly with fuse.
     
    Filippo 9800pro, Sep 23, 2007
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  9. sulkorp

    sulkorp Notebook Deity

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    Does anyone know why apple doesn't include NTFS wrtiting in their osx? It's not like it's impossible to do cause many devs have done it. Anyone know the official reason?
     
    sulkorp, Sep 23, 2007
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  10. Budding

    Budding Notebook Virtuoso

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    Probably the same reason Microsoft does not support HFS+ read and write in their OSes.
     
    Budding, Sep 23, 2007
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  11. smiley_lauf

    smiley_lauf Notebook Consultant

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    I guess the nexx question is: if not natively supported, then how reliable are MacFUSE and NTFS-3G? I have read that data and drives could get corrupted? --that was what the discliamer read when I tried using it in Ubuntu Linux (ntfs-3g that is); use at own risk they said.
     
    smiley_lauf, Sep 23, 2007
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  12. sulkorp

    sulkorp Notebook Deity

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    Well I don't know about why microsoft doesn't include it, but they don't include native support for most(correct me if im wrong) *nix file systems. Although osx does include support for them (since I'ts running on it)
    But still, why make it difficult for the end user, with no knowledge of these things. If the average person were to want to write to an external hdd thats ntfs, then theyd run into problems, or hfs in windows. : s
     
    sulkorp, Sep 23, 2007
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  13. Budding

    Budding Notebook Virtuoso

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    Apple has provided more support for file systems than Microsoft has. It is probably just competition. Each wants to try and monopolise the market in some way, and not fully supporting other file systems just happens to be one way.
     
    Budding, Sep 23, 2007
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  14. taelrak

    taelrak Lost

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    Well, when you install any software, somewhere in the documentation there'll a phrase saying basically "install at your own risk, we're not liable if the sky falls on your head because you installed this"...

    I haven't had any problems with MacFUSe and ntfs-3g at all. If all you're doing is using the basic functionality, I doubt you'd run into any problems at all. Of course, if you like to play with all your software (for example manually editing the fstab file or messing with Apple's own driver files to get a bit more functionality out of ntfs-3g), then you might run into problems if you're not careful.
     
    taelrak, Sep 23, 2007
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  15. Filippo 9800pro

    Filippo 9800pro Notebook Enthusiast

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    NTFS is NOT an open source file system, if microsoft don't open the code, no one than micro can build a complete features (such as writing) support for this crappy n' old file system... Probably they only show how to read (useless..) and all the work done by ntsf-3g is pure reverse eng.! They MUST to write a disclaimer that remove themself by having legal trobles!
     
    Filippo 9800pro, Sep 24, 2007
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  16. Starlight

    Starlight Notebook Evangelist

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    I always thought it had to do with some form of file system copyright Microsoft has for NTFS that Apple don't want to pay for getting access to the full thing (duh). And while I was writing this post another post came in that explains what I mean even better (see above post by Filippo).

    And of course there's always the "why would they" reason, same with Microsoft really. It helps some few (mostly more tech-savvy) customers, but the majority don't have use for it.
     
    Starlight, Sep 24, 2007
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  17. Filippo 9800pro

    Filippo 9800pro Notebook Enthusiast

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    Yep star...

    Finally i think, if you need a spare and little use (such as moving some files and use ntfs partition/disk for storage) ntfs-3g is a very reliable feature, but if you plan to use the disk as an important storage of personal data or to run heavy programs on it i think you may orient yourself to other FS, such as FAT32... Reasons? Poor velocity perfomance and a non proprietary implementation that implicate not maximal security for data integrity...
     
    Filippo 9800pro, Sep 25, 2007
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  18. ltcommander_data

    ltcommander_data Notebook Deity

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    I believe Microsoft's official explanation for keeping NTFS closed source is that there are security features in it that they feel will be compromised if they allow everyone access to the source code. NTFS can be licensed now, but I guess either Microsoft isn't willing to sell to Apple or Apple doesn't feel it's worth the effort in supporting it. Lack of write support for NTFS may have been why the quick switching feature between OS X and Windows that was supposed to be in Leopard was cancelled.
     
    ltcommander_data, Sep 25, 2007
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