how to free up space on mac with external hard drive

Step 5: Then type 'diskutil list' again to take a look at the formatting procedure. Step 4: Now, wait for a while to let the process finish. MBRFormat (Manages the Disk utility to utilize Master Boot Record to format).

You might need to wait for a while (depending on the drive's size) before it's available to use again. Scrolling this option to most secure will overwrite the drive seven times. In the next step, you will have the option to overwrite the drive 3x times. Step 8: If you have sensitive data in your external hard drive and want to format it completely, you can continue moving the slider to the right. It will completely overwrite the whole drive with all data erased.

If you want entirely to erase everything from your external hard drive, you can move the slider to the next second option 'This option writes a single pass of zeros over the entire disk'. In other words, you, or someone else can resurrect the files by using any paid data recovery software. Step 7: It will completely erase the drive information however, underlying files intact might be hidden there. Important note: This step is crucial to make sure the files in the drive are safely erased. This option will come up with a slider, which will range from fastest to most secure. Now another window will pop up, which will allow you to choose how you would like to format your drive. Step 6: Then click on the Security Options button. You can give any name of your choice but choose a name that can indicate what type of files you will have in there. Step 5: Now the next step is to give a name to the drive. Here's the step by step method on how you can format the external hard drive for Mac. Part 1: How to Use Disk Utility to Format External Hard Drive on Macĭisk Utility on Mac lets you erase and format external hard drives to use with your Mac. In this article, we have compiled up each step to learn how to format an external hard drive. But what happens if your external hard drive on Mac becomes corrupted? If you are trying to connect your external hard drive to a Mac, you may need to format an external hard drive before using it, because it file system does not match. Free DownloadĮveryone loves their valuable data and keep them safe in external hard drives. If you found you have lost data after formatting the hard drive on Mac, try external hard drive recovery software to find them. In this case, you should learn how to use disk utility to format external hard drive. And sometimes, a pop-up tells you to format external hard drive on Mac because it is corrupted or virus attacked. Sometimes when you connect your external hard drive with Mac, only to find it does not work at all.

How to free up space on mac with external hard drive