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Formatting External HDD for general usage.... (Xbox/PS3/PC)

  • 04-01-2010 3:02pm
    #1
    Riesen_Meal
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 10,580 ✭✭✭✭


    Hi Guys,

    Mods if this is in the wrong forum please feel free to move!

    I recently purchased an external HDD (Danelec 1.5TB) for general data usage my laptop was just filling up rapidly and I needed something to store stuff on!

    It comes pre-formatted to FAT 32, which was fine initially but of course the 4gb limit rears its ugly head for me, so, ive decided to re-format it.....

    My problem being, at the moment (FAT32) it is not being "seen" by the xbox 360 at all (a lot of random characters are displayed, tildas, latin and whatnot) and none of the vids/music are displayed on the device....

    When I plug it into the PS3 it can "see" the name of the drive, but not the contents (which I gathered it would do as the PS3 does not use NTFS)

    Now, my question is, is it possible to partition the drive into 3 types of format?

    1. FAT 32 (for Xbox AVIs / Etc)
    2. NTFS (For those over 4GB HD movie for PS3)
    3. HFS + (I use macs a fair bit and would like to put aside a bit of space for music stuff, I also believe that the PS3/Xbox 360 can use the HFS+ File system - if thats the case, this would be fine either?

    My main OS is Vista (going to change to 7 but am waiting to get this stuff sorted before I upgrade) but I also have an XP desktop (generally unused)

    And IF I do partition into 3 different "types" of format, will it be as easy as to "drag and drop" all my stuff straight from the laptop into the portable HDD at the moment?

    All responses are greatly appreciated, otherwise ill have to send this HDD back and get a different one....

    And when partitioning, what program would you use, I know of Partition Magic and EAESUS Partition Master but do not have much experience with either of these programs myself.....

    I look forward to your response,

    Thanks,

    Dave


Comments

  • #2
    ED E
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 36,170 ✭✭✭✭ED E


    I don't know if the PS3 can take WMP shares, but if it can I'd suggest doing that way. Leave the drive attached to the PC, set up a media share and then read all the files remotely. The Xbox does it for sure, I do it all the time without any issues. That of course presumes that they are all networked an that Sony integrated WMP compatibility.

    Going the same route you are now, google gives me this:
    The Xbox 360 supports removable and portable devices via USB. Most of these devices use the FAT32 file system which is capable of volume sizes up to 2 TB. Windows 2000 and XP can read and write to FAT32 volumes of large size but cannot natively create or format them above 32 GB. In order to create a FAT32 partition and format it above 32GB you will need a utility like Partition Magic or some other drive/partition utility. Windows 98 does support the creation and formatting of FAT32 partitions up to 127 GB in size. If you have 98 installed or a 98 boot disk with FDISK.EXE and FORMAT.COM you would have all you need for up to that 127GB mark pending your drive is installed via the IDE interface or you have a USB driver loaded.

    This is a really simple process. First assemble the drive with the USB adapter. Next plug the unit into your PC. If your running Windows XP most USB adapters will be automatically recognized and installed. If you are running an older operating system you may need to install a driver for the adapter

    Next create a new FAT32 partition on the newly installed device. Again if the drive is larger than 32GB you will need to use a utility like Partition Magic to create the volume. If the drive is smaller than 32GB you can accomplish this via the "Computer Management" snap in found in the Control Panel -> Administrative tools. Last you need to format the volume. The same rule applies for formatting as well; if it is larger than 32GB you will need some other utility like partition magic to format. Again, windows XP and 2000 does not natively support the creation and formatting of devices larger than 32GB but it does support reading and writing from these large partitions.

    Once you've got it all done you should be able to load content to the drive via windows. Plug it into your 360 and go to media and select portable device and bam.. there's YOUR media. Again USB storage devices cannot be used for Xbox Live Marketplace content.

    Did you give the drive a weird name - Very long/unusual characters? I'd try formatting it as one FAT32 partition with a one word name with only upper/lower case standard characters and test.


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