I have a new EASYSTORE and have followed instructions which just said plug it into the computer. It appears on my desktop. I have tried to transfer small files to the drive and they won’t transfer (cut and paste or drag and drop)
Hi rickmarotte,
WD Easystore hard drive comes preformatted in NTFS file format which would be in Read Only to see files in macOS. You can reformat drive in macOS Extended File Format (or HFS+), supported by macOS to access and write data files.
Note: Formatting of drive is a data destructive process and can’t be undone.
You may refer below provided link for your convenience.
Did you check the format of your EasyStore portable drive? If not, press Command + Space, type “Disk Utility”, and hit Enter. Once it opens, select your drive from the left sidebar. You will see the file system format listed right under the drive’s name at the top or in the status details at the bottom. If it says Windows NTFS, that is why you cannot transfer files from your MacBook to the drive.
By default, a Mac can open and view files on an NTFS drive, but it cannot save or copy new files to it. Your external drive is not broken or corrupted; it is simply a built-in compatibility limitation between Mac and Windows systems. [Here is a helpful blog where you can find more information: How to Enable NTFS Read-Write Support on Mac ]
To freely copy and save files to your portable drive, you can choose one of these two options:
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Format the drive to exFAT in Disk Utility to make it permanently compatible with both Mac and Windows.
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Use third-party software on your Mac so it can write to the drive without needing to erase your files.
