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I always thought you could back up Mac to an external drive using xfat. However, I am reading everywhere where people are having difficulty doing this as. Is Apple changed its way of thinking.
Is APFS the only format read and write to external drive as of July 2023?
Windows, Windows 10
You would be best served to use an APFS formatted drive to backup up your Mac with Time Machine. Here's how it works: Back up your files with Time Machine on Mac - Apple Support. Its format, APFS, is the only one that a Photos library can be backed up to without the possibility of damage.
I use a second backup disk with Carbon Copy Cloner and backup specific folders. It can be set to backup hourly or at any time interval or when it detects a change in the source data. You can't go back in time to recover a certain version of a file like you can with Time Machine.
Macs were using extended Journaled but now with Ventura is only APFS. Your Time Machine may back up to an external drive for a while using exfat, not always, but when you need to use that backup to restore with it won't work!
You can still copy files to an ExFAT formatted drive. You just can't use an ExFAT formatted drive for Time Machine.
FWIW, it was never possible to use Time Machine with an ExFAT formatted drive. Once again, you can copy files from a Mac to an ExFAT drive.
My personal feeling sense Time Machine is so basic and with modern silicon Macs with NVME style hard drives Apple created APFS for NVME drive APFS! So only NVME or SSD external DAS should use NVME and older style platter drives should only be formatted with the older HFL+ format for better storage in DAS drives!
In my search, I find so many people who are not aware of this frustrating themselves trying to find work arounds.
this will eventually get around to everyone in the meanwhile people are stressing.
I found it very useful to be able to go from one platform to the other with exfat.
I was used to Macrium, reflect which imaged windows perfectly to an external drive.
I was thinking of going Mac and if I can transfer data as you say, I may still do it.
it may be so that expect can never be used in the past however, if you search the web, every place says that it can.
There is a lot of misleading information out there.
I was interested in simply imaging or backing up my OS as I do with Windows. I would need to occasionally use a drive to communicate between the platforms.
It does not seem feasible so I will continue with Windows 11, however, I do appreciate the information.
Btw,I do finnd a person on YouTube to vbe very knowledgeable with Mac and demonstratsb mac operations well.
.I think he is Gary and may be well known to the forum.
As of December of 2023 library files will no longer open on non-Apple formatted drives. I'd copy all data to Mac internal HD, reformat drive using disk utility afterwards, then move data back to drive
BobbyBrown254254 wrote:
As of December of 2023 library files will no longer open on non-Apple formatted drives.
What library files are you talking about?
For what reason do you need them to open? The files inside of library are there to support things running on macOS, which won’t run on a non-apple format drive.
APFS is the only option in Ventura to back up using Time Machine.
If your actual question is, "Can I transfer my data from a Windows PC to a Mac?", the answer is yes.
Transfer from PC to Mac with Migration Assistant - Apple Support
Has it always been this way as of July 2023 or is this a new change by Mac?
Too bad for me as I need to use flash drives with both windows and Mac.
I agree with this. You can definitely use the external HD by just copying data over, and not use Time Machine.
Glad you agree. 😎
Back up to external drive in exfat.
