Routing Download To External Hard Drive Mac

Mac Free External Hard Drive Recovery is the leading Mac Data Recovery software specially designed for external hard drive to recover files lost due to deletion, format, raw, virus attack, system.

An incompatible file system, faulty permission settings, and unexpected formatting error are all likely to cause your external hard drive to show up as 'Read Only' on your Mac. Luckily, there are solutions to these problems, either by formatting the device, changing settings, or repairing your device. Besides, if you get your data lost during the problem-solving process, you can retrieve your data with EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard. Try these tips without worries!

Don't worry when your external hard drive displays as read-only on Mac. This page includes 3 reliable solutions that can assist you in removing the 'read-only' error from your external hard drive, making it readable again on Mac. Pick up any method below to make your device accessible without losing any data now:

SymptomsThe External Hard Drive Shows Up as 'Read Only' on Mac, Help!

'Hi there, do you know how to make the external hard drive accessible again when it shows as 'Read Only' on Mac computer? I'm having this problem that my Seagate external hard drive suddenly turned to read-only this morning when I connected it to Mac. I could only read and view saved data on the drive. But get no access to use the data on my external hard drive. If you have any clues to get permissions to access the read-only external hard drive on Mac, please tell me. Thanks very much.'

If you right-click your external storage device, select 'Get Info', and see 'You can only read' at the bottom of the info window, you are encountering one of the commonest problems with an external hard drive. When your external hard drive or other external storage devices show up as 'Read Only' on your Mac, you can:

• Open the drive and view the files
• copy files from the external storage drive

You can't:

• Copy files to the device
• Delete files from the external drive

When you can't use your external storage devices normally, it could be quite annoying and frustrating for the problem not only represents a threat to your work efficiency but also shows the possibility of data loss.

ReasonsWhy Is Your External Hard Drive Read-Only on Mac

Why can you only read the external hard drive that is connected to your Mac? There are three possible reasons.

The File System Is NTFS

Right-click your hard disk and select 'Get Info'. If you find your external hard drive is NTFS format, that's what the cause is. The incompatibility of the file system is the main cause of the error-external hard drive 'Read Only' on Mac. NTFS is a file system that is optimal for Windows-based computer. Although the Mac operating system allows you to read the files on external hard drive, you can't write files to it because the way that NTFS writes data to the device is incompatible with the way of macOS doing it. (Go to the Fix.)

The Permission Settings Is Not Ignored

An external hard drive is subject to the access permission set up by OS X for all files and folders on the system. When you use the device on another computer with a different OS, the permission settings with it may not be recognized or prevent access to the files on the hard disk. (Go to the Fix.)

The Hard Drive has Formatting Errors

Another common cause for the external hard drive 'Read Only' problem on Mac is the formatting errors of the storage device itself. If you see a warning says the device is only being mounted in read-only mode while connecting, your hard disk is diagnosed to have formatting errors that prevent you from writing files to it. (Go to the Fix.)

Identify the cause that leads to the 'Read Only' error on your Mac from the information above, then follow the corresponding solution to solve the problem with ease.

FixesHow Can You Solve the External Hard Drive 'Read-only' Problem on Your Mac

Based on different reasons, there are three solutions to the problem.

Fix 1: Reformat the External Hard Drive

If your external hard drive is read-only on your Mac due to its NTFS file system, you can easily fix it by reformatting the device to a Mac-compatible format with the built-in Disk Utility on Mac. Before that, remember to back up your external hard drive quickly with a highly-efficient data backup software since the formatting will erase all the files on the device.

Step 1: Launch 'Disk Utility'.

• Head to 'Applications' > 'Utilities'.
• Or tap 'Command + Space' and type Disk Utility.

Step 2: In the list of available drives on the left, choose the problematic external hard drive. Then click the 'Erase' option in the main window.

Step 3: Choose a proper file system and rename your hard disk. (Both APFS and Mac OS Extended file system are Mac-exclusive. Thus, if you want your external hard drive to be both Mac and PC compatible, choose MS-DOS, also known as FAT, or ExFAT instead.)

Step 4: Click Erase to reformatting your external hard drive.

Wait for the reformatting process to complete and then go to the information window, this time you will see the 'You can only read' has changed to 'You can read and write', which means you can read and write the drive on your Mac normally.

Generally speaking, when a storage device shows up as read-only, you can still copy files off of it. If you cannot view or see all saved data on the drive, don't worry. After you format it, you can use the Professional Mac hard drive recovery software - EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard for Mac to get back your lost data on the drive with simple clicks:

External Drives Mac

Step 1. Select the disk location (it can be an internal HDD/SSD or a removable storage device) where you lost data and files. Click the 'Scan' button.

Step 2. EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard for Mac will immediately scan your selected disk volume and display the scanning results on the left pane.

Step 3. In the scan results, select the file(s) and click the 'Recover Now' button to have them back.

Fix 2: Ignore Permissions

If you are sure the problem is caused by the permission settings, you just need to ignore the permissions to solve the 'Read Only' external hard drive problem on your Mac.

Step 1: Right-click your external hard drive shown on your Mac and select 'Get Info'.

Step 2: Expand the 'Sharing & Permissions' section, then click the lock to authenticate.

Step 3: Check 'Ignore ownership on this volume'.

Fix 3: Check and Repair Hard Drive errors

If there is formatting error on your external hard drive that makes the device read-only, you can use Disk Utility to check the errors and repair the external storage device.

Step 1: Go to 'Disk Utility'.

• Head to 'Applications' > 'Utilities'.
• Or tap 'Command + Space' and type Disk Utility.

Step 2: Highlight the read-only external hard drive, click 'First Aid' in the top center, then click 'Run'.

Usually Windows cannot read Mac formatted drive, but if you wish to use third party tools that can fill up the gap and provide access to Mac interface with Apple’s HFS+ file system on windows.

One thing you should keep in mind while dealing with this kind of scenario is that when you connect your Mac formatted drive to Windows, you will be informed to erase it with notification “you need to format the disk in drive X: before you can use it.” Just don’t click “Format” or else all the contents of the drive will be gone once and for all. Rather click “Cancel” to avoid the situation. The message generally pops up because Windows does not understand or recognize the Apple’s HFS+ file system. So don’t format until you get the important files out of the drive. But if it does not contain any important files, then you can surely go ahead by clicking the “Format” button.

Here in this article we would use certain third party tools to read the Mac formatted drive on Windows. Just carry on reading to learn the methods in real.

Method #1: Use HFSExplorer To Read Mac on Windows

It is freeware software available easily on the internet and can be used to read Mac files on Windows interface. Although HFSExplorer is not that fancy in appearance, but it does not install any driver that gets integrated with windows file explorer. So you can only open, read and copy the Mac OS files to Windows directory. In order to know its usage read carefully the steps mentioned below:

Step 1. Download HFSExplorer and install it accurately on your Windows PC.

Step 2. Connect your Mac formatted drive to your Windows PC and launch the HFSExplorer with admin privileges.

Step 3. Now go to “File” menu and click on “Load file system from device..”. It will trace your connected drive all of its own accord and you can easily load it.

Step 4. Once the files system is loaded you can see the file contents of the Mac formatted drive on the Graphical window.

Step 5. Select your files, and click “Extract” and choose a folder to save the extracted materials. They will straight away be copied to the location you have chosen on PC.

Also read: How to wipe a Mac clean before selling

Apple Mac External Hard Drive

Method #2:Open .Pages on Windows using iCloud

Opening a .page file format on Windows is not as simple as double-clicking the file and accessing it right away. But as long as you have the access to Apple ID, or any web browser like Chrome, Firefox, or Internet Explorer, you can definitely pull off the task. Just go through the method description given below to actuate the task:

Step 1. From your Windows PC, open any of your default browser and visit iCloud.com.

Step 2. Next you have to sign in with your Apple ID. If you don’t have one, you can create one by the Sign-up option posted on the webpage. Now the surprising part is that signing up for an Apple ID immediately grants you 5 GB of free iCloud storage and this is what we are going to put to use in this tutorial.

Step 3. Once you are signed in to your Apple ID, click on the “Pages” icon and new windows will pop up.

Step 4. Click on “Settings” icon which is actually a “gear” icon and click on “Upload Document” option from the context menu. Again a new window will open up, and you have got to browse the pages that you wish to edit and upload it.

Routing Download To External Hard Drive Macos

Step 5. Now to do the editing part, there are options available:

• Once the pages have been uploaded to iCloud, you can directly open and edit the documents utilizing web-friendly version of the Pages on the browser. It may not have all the tools you require as that of the Page app, yet it is commendable for quick changes.
• Secondly, you can click on “Tools” icon and choose “Download a Copy” option form the sub-menu and select “word” to re-export the documents as Word-friendly files and open it using MS work in your Windows PC. The documents will be downloaded as .doc file and is made available for further download on your PC.

Step 6. Your file would now be downloaded with .doc extension which can be easily accessed with MS Word Processors.

Conclusion:

Whether you use Mac or Windows OS, there shall obviously come a time when you will be bound to do use documents on both the systems, and you would definitely need a way out to open and modify documents between both the OS. Now running documents with .doc or .docx extension of windows is not that difficult to run on Mac, but if you decide to open .page file on Windows, follow the guidelines elaborated above.