Seagate For Mac
- Seagate For Mac On Windows
- Seagate External Hard Drive For Mac
- Seagate For Mac Driver
- Seagate Installer For Mac
- Seagate For Mac External Hard Drive
Verdict on theSeagate Expansion for Mac Review
With 1TB, 2TB 3TB, 4TB and 5TB you’ll find the Seagate Expansion Portable has plenty of storage options. Yes it’s a basic drive but don’t let that put you off.
Its price per TB is attractive. And you’ll find that most users love its reliable performance and speed.
Plus youcan easily have it working on your Mac.
Pros of theSeagate Expansion Portable
Cons of theSeagate Expansion Portable
The SeagateExpansion Portable is very much an external hard drive you should check out.
SeagateExpansion Portable Drive Unboxing Video
Chris – besides the formatting difference, there is software on the PC version and no software on the Mac version. Also, there are two versions of Mac products – FreeAgent Go Pro for Mac (has USB AND Firewire 800), and FreeAgent Go for Mac USB (USB 2.0 only). The Seagate “for Mac” drive displays in (My) Computer and Windows/File Explorer as a drive letter (for example, E:). COMPATIBLE OPERATING SYSTEMS Windows 7 32 and 64-Bit. Oct 09, 2019 This wikiHow teaches you how to format a Seagate Hard Drive on a Mac computer. You can format a drive using the Disk Utility in Mac. Before formatting any hard drive, it's a good idea to backup any data or files you want to save before formatting. Formatting the drive will permanently erase all the data and files stored on the hard drive forever.
I recently bought a Seagate for Mac 1 TB external hard drive. When I connect to my MacBook through the FireWire, it works fine, but I also have media on my Dell laptop which is running Windows Vista.
You mayfind it interesting to take a look at what comes in your Seagate ExpansionPortable’s box.
This 1minute 53 seconds video shows you exactly what you’re going to get when you buythis drive.
Seagate Expansion Portable 4TB – Unboxing
Video Credit: xgadgetde
You can Click on the picture to see the current price of the Seagate Expansion Portable on Amazon (Commissions Earned)
10 Reasonsto Buy a Seagate Expansion Portable Drive for Your Mac
1. Buyyourself a Seagate Expansion Portable When You Just need a Drive
What do Imean by this?
You’ll findthe Seagate Expansion hard drive has no frills and is a basic drive.
What do Imean by a basic drive?
Realizethat you’ll get a drive with no fancy colors. You’ll find it in black with adiamond surface pattern that is smart to look at.
But there’sno special backup software. Or hardware based password protection. Or hardwareencryption offered on the Seagate Expansion external hard drive itself.
And thereality is, when you buy an external drive with of many of these frills. Theyare typically designed to run on a Windows PC anyway. Not on your Mac.
But not toworry. The beauty of your Mac’s operating system is that Mac OS can passwordprotect your precious documents.
And encryptyour Expansion Portable external hard drive anyway.
2. YourSeagate Expansion External Hard Drive Comes NTFS
NTFS?
You may’venoticed that the marketing for the Seagate Expansion Portable says nothingabout Mac.
This isbecause Seagate delivers it ready to plug into a Windows PC.
NTFS is a file system a Windows PC uses.
Your Maccan read an NTFS drive. But when you want to put your files on there it’llappear blocked.
But withfive minutes and a little know how you can have your new Seagate Expansionworking on your Mac.
It willjust need reformatting first.
How is thisa reason to buy? And is it worth it?
Do you passover the Expansion Portable drive? And buy yourself a drive that comes readyformatted for your Mac.
Well youcould.
But as mostof the drives out there are NTFS formatted. And there is a price premiumcharged for Mac formatted drives.
Why nottake the five minutes and format your Expansion Portable for your Mac. And takeadvantage of a better price?
You can find out how to reformat your Seagate Expansion Portable in this article here on the site.
3. YourSeagate Expansion is a USB Powered Portable Drive
What doesthat mean?
Your Macpowers your Seagate Expansion external hard drive.
This meansthat you’ll only need your USB cable.
And whenyou’re carrying around your Seagate Expansion with you. There’s no separatepower cable or international plug adaptor to remember.
Your USBcable is used for both power and sending files.
Imagineyourself abroad. You’ll only need to find yourself a power adaptor for your Mac.
And as longas your Mac has enough power then you can use your Seagate Expansion externaldrive.
4. SeagateExpansion Portable Connecting Up to your Mac
You’ll wantme to review one key to know.
Your Seagate Expansion is a USB 3.0 drive that comes with a USB cable.
Now thiscable has a type A connection at the end you plug into your Mac.
Does yourMac date before the late 2016 Mac models? Then your Seagate Expansion Portablewill plug straight in.
If yourMacBook Pro, Macbook Air or iMac model is after that, it’s likely to have a USBC port.
The greatthing about the USB standard is that it’s backwards compatible.
Your olderMac will send your files to the faster Seagate Expansion at the speed it can.
And foryour newer Mac you just order yourself an adaptor cable and plug right in.
Your newer Mac with USB C/Thunderbolt ports will send your files to your Seagate Expansion Portable at USB 3.0 speed.
Need an adaptor cable for your Mac?
I quite like this USB replacement cable. And it’s at a budget price on Amazon. (Commissions Earned)
Link to the AmazonBasics USB Type-C to Micro B 3 foot cable on Amazon.
Risks are inherent in the use of the Internet. How to search for mp4 files on mac. Apple makes no representations regarding third-party website accuracy or reliability.
You’ll find a longer explanation of the difference USB ports. And which Mac generations have which ports. Plus images in a document on the site at this link.
5. What canyou Use Your Seagate Expansion For on Your Mac?
Let’sreview what you can use your Expansion Portable for.
You’ve twomain options in formatting your Seagate Expansion drive for Mac.
Format yourExpansion Drive to Mac OS file system and you can:
- Drag and Drop any files to your Expansion Portable
- Copy and Paste your photos, music, documents. All your files
- Use your Seagate Expansion Portable to backup up to with Time Machine
Format your Seagate Expansion Portable to ExFAT. Then you can:
- Share your drive between your Mac and a Windows PC
- Drag and Drop your files to the Expansion Portable
- Or copy and paste
Learn here how you can use your Seagate Expansion Portable in this article on the site.
6. Speed ofyour Seagate Expansion Portable
In USB 3.0testing your Seagate Expansion is capable of 120 MBps writing speed. And nearly130 MBps reading speed.
Which putsit up there as one of the fastest portable hard drives in its class.
And unlessyou’re doing heavy Photo Shop work. Or video editing then you’ll find the speedof your Seagate Expansion Portable just fine.
And the drive will be a lot cheaper to buy than a Thunderbolt drive.
Seagate For Mac On Windows
And when you’re looking to put your music collection, movies or videos. Or use your Seagate Expansion for backup of your Mac you’ll be pleased with its performance.
7. What dousers of the Seagate Expansion Portable Think?
You canreview what users of the Seagate Expansion Portable have to say about yourdrive on Amazon.
Click on the button to go through to the sales page. (Commissions Earned)
Scroll downto the bottom and change the view from ‘Top Rated’ reviews to the ‘RecentReviews’.
You’ll findit more useful to see what the buyers over the last couple of months have tosay. Rather than a view on a shipped drive years ago.
8. Your SeagateExpansion Drive Capacity, Size and Weight
YourSeagate Expansion comes in 1TB, 2TB 3TB, 4TB and 5TB storage sizes. And is aneasy size and weight to carry around with you.
Here areits vital statistics.
Seagate Expansion Portable
| Capacity | Size | Weight |
| 1TB, 2TB | 4.7” x 3.2” x 0.6” | 6 oz. |
| 3TB, 4TB, 5TB | 4.7″ x 3.2″ x 0.8″ | 8.4 oz. |
YourSeagate Expansion Portable gives you plenty of storage options. No matterwhether you’re a student. Or a professional using your Mac.
Modelnumbers for your reference.
| STEA1000400 – 1TB |
| STEA2000400 – 2TB |
| STEA2000400 – 3TB |
| STEA4000400 – 4TB |
| STEA5000402 – 5TB |
Even thoughyour Seagate Expansion is sold as a portable external hard drive.
And isconvenient for you to carry around. It is a mechanical drive.
This meansthat your Expansion Portable has moving parts.
A drop or a fall could damage your drive.
You’d best carry your Seagate Expansion Portable around in a protective case.
Here are some of my preferred protective cases, with links to them on Amazon: (Commissions Earned)
9. What’sin the Seagate Expansion Portable Box When you Buy?
When shipped toyou you’ll find:
- Your Seagate Expansion Portable hard drive
- An 18-inch USB 3.0 cable, which is also compatible with USB 2.0
- The Quick Start Guide
You’ll find the Quick Start Guide is brief. Pretty much a picture of plugging in your Seagate Expansion.
You can take a look at the Seagate Expansion Portable Quick Start Guide here.
10. The Warrantyon your Seagate Expansion Portable
YourSeagate Expansion 1TB, 2TB, 3TB, 4TB and 5TB’s have 1 years warranty.
It’s alittle short in my view but then you’re buying a basic drive.
Althoughyour Seagate Expansion Portable drive is generally reliable. You’ll find thereare reports of early drive failures.
So keepyour warranty close to hand.
You should bear in mind when Seagate’s Limited Warranty is valid. It only applies when you buy your Seagate Expansion through an authorized reseller.
You can take a look at the high level warranty conditions at this link.
Last Words
And thereyou have it. All the reasons to buy yourself a Seagate Expansion Portable drivefor your Mac.
I hope this review will have shown you that you can definitely use it on your Mac.
Related Documents
Want to see where the Seagate Expansion appears on my list of the Best External Drives for Mac?
You’ve looked at buying a Seagate Backup Plus – Ultra Touch, Slim or Portable. But it says that it works with a Windows PC only.
You’re freaking out.
How can you make this portable external drive workwith your Mac?
The answer is yes. You can.
There are two ways:
- Use a software driver. And you can find out about it in my article here.
- Or Format your Seagate Backup Plus on your Mac.
And in this article I tell you all about it.
You can learn more about Seagate Backup Plus on this site by clicking on the picture above
How to Format your Seagate Backup Plus for Mac
Hold on!
Before you jump in and format your Seagate Backup Plus on your Mac or Macbook. Know that formatting deletes all the information on the drive.
If you have documents on the drive either from aWindows PC or from your Mac, copy them off first. Or you will lose them.
1. Turn on your Mac. Log yourself in.
Then plug your USB cable into your Seagate Backup Plus first.
Whether you have an Ultra Touch, Slim or Portable your hard drive is powered by its USB cable.
This means that your Backup Plus takes its power from your iMac or MacBook.
And if you’re low on battery power then plug your Macinto external power.
Put the drive on a stable safe surface before you plugit into your Mac and power it up.
These aren’t rugged drives and it’s better not toknock or shake them while they are working.
All the Seagate Backup Plus drives except the Ultra Touch come with USB A plug connections for the end that goes into your Mac.
This is fine if you have 2015 or earlier iMac or MacBook. Later MacBook’s come with USB C (3.1) or Thunderbolt connections.
And if you have a USB C port on your Mac you’ll needan adaptor cable. This adaptor cables changes the USB A end to USB C.
They are easy to get on Amazon. And if you want to stick to the Apple brand then the Apple USB-C to USB Adapter (Commissions Earned) is the one to use. Follow the link to see it on Amazon.
The Seagate Backup Plus Ultra Touch comes with a USB-C adaptor plug. This means that you’ll be able to plug it into an earlier or later Mac and use the adaptor if you need too.
When you’ve connected your Seagate Backup Plus Slim, Ultra Touch or Portable. Its LED light should light and the drive starts up.
2. Look for the Backup Plus external hard drive iconon your desktop.
Don’t see it?
Check your finder window preferences.
Open a new finder window. And then choose to see yourfinder window preferences.
Click the boxes to show ‘Hard Disks’ and ‘ExternalDisks’ on your desktop.
Then you’re Seagate Backup Plus will show up.
3. Open Disk Utility.
Disk Utility is the software on your Mac that willchange your Seagate Backup Plus’ drive format.
You can find Disk Utility by doing a spotlight search.
The spotlight search magnifying glass is at the top ofyour desktop screen. Click on it there.
Then type in Disk Utility.
Double click on Disk Utility
Seagate External Hard Drive For Mac
4. The left side of the Disk Utility window shows you all the drives you have connected to your Mac.
Both the Internal and External drives. Your Seagate Backup Plus drive is listed under the External Drives List.
If for some reason its not there take a look at my FAQquestions at the end of this article.
Click on your Seagate Backup Plus in the External drives list. The little arrow head to the left of your drive name will open up the different levels.
Take care to click at the top level.
The level the yellow arrow in the picture points at.
The formatting won’t work if you click on the drive atthe wrong level.
Your Disk Utility window not showing you the drivelevels?
Look to the top left of your Disk Utility pop upwindow. Click to open up the view options.
Then select to show all devices. That will show the drive and the volume.
5. Then take a look at the top of the Disk Utilitywindow and click on Erase.
Concerned about clicking on Erase?
Don’t worry. Erase is the Mac’s way of reformattingyour Seagate Backup Drive. Nothingactually happens until you fill in some information on the next screen.
6. The next window is where you set up how you wouldlike your Seagate Backup Plus formatted.
The first thing for you to do on this window is giveyour Seagate Backup Plus external drive a name.
It’s best to have a name that makes it easy for you tofind the Backup Plus on your desktop. Or a name that tells you what you’re usingthis hard drive for.
Once you have typed in the name. Next set the format.Click on the up, down arrows to pick a format.
You choose Mac OS Extended (Journaled) if you plan toonly use the Backup Plus on your Mac.
And you want to copy and paste your documents to theSeagate drive.
This is the format you choose when you want yourSeagate Backup Plus for Time Machine backups on your Mac.
If you’re planning to share the Seagate Backup Pluswith a Windows PC choose ExFAT.
ExFAT is the file system format both iMac or Macbookand a Windows PC can understand and use.
But Time Machine can’t use an ExFat formatted Seagate Backup Plus drive for backup.
7. Check the Scheme says GUID Partition Map.
And then Click on Erase to begin your Backup Plusformatting.
Formatting only takes a few minutes. You’ll besurprised how quickly it finishes.
Formatting takes a little longer on a larger SeagateBackup Plus drive.
When your Backup Plus drive formatting finishes youcan get rid of the Disk Utility window.
8. Your Seagate Backup Plus will be on your desktop.
As an external hard drive icon with the name you gave it.
Now you can use the drive. Want some pointers on how?
Have a look at my article all about how to use your Seagate Backup Plus at this link.
When You’re finished Formatting or Using Your SeagateBackup Plus
When you’re done with your Seagate drive be sure toeject the drive. Do this before unplugging your USB cable out from your Mac.
While you’re busy copying and pasting files to yourBackup Plus. Or just using the drive day to day your Mac keeps some informationfor your drive in memory. By ejectingyou tell your Mac to write anything it is holding in memory down to yourSeagate Backup Plus. Closing everything off nicely.
If you forget to do this you risk ruining theinformation on your drive.
You do this by right clicking on your Seagate BackupPlus on your desktop.
And choosing Eject from the Menu.
Wait till the drive icon has disappeared from yourdesktop. And the light stops flashing on your Backup Plus drive.
Then you can plug out your USB cable and put yourSeagate Backup Plus Drive away.
And now you’re done. You have found out how to formatyour Seagate Backup Plus in 8 easy steps.
Frequently Asked Questions
Format Seagate Backup Plus – Why Would You?
Seagate Technology sells a few portable hard drives with the Backup Plus name. The Seagate Backup Plus Slim and the Seagate Backup Plus Portable were sold with a HFS+ option.
HFS+ is the file system a Mac uses.
The Seagate Backup Plus Slim now come in an ExFAT format. You’d reformat if you wanted to use the drive for a Time Machine backup.
You’ll find that the Backup Plus Ultra Touch and Backup Plus Portable are NTFS formatted.
When you’ve an NTFS formatted Seagate Backup Plus. Andyou want to use it on your iMac or Macbook Pro without a special driver.
Or lift the restriction of ‘Read Only’. So you can write to this drive or update the files on there.
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You use the format steps above to change a NTFS orExFAT Backup Plus to the format you want.
When do you Format Seagate Backup Plus for a Mac?
When your Seagate Backup Plus has an ExFAT or NTFS file system on it and you want to change to HFS+
When you want to wipe the Backup Plus drive clear ofeverything on it.
When you want to change an NTFS file system to ExFAT so that you can share your Backup Plus between a Mac and a PC. Having an ExFAT file system allows you swap your Backup Plus drive between a Mac and a Windows PC.
I Don’t Understand, What is NTFS Format on a SeagateBackup Plus
NTFS describes the Seagate Backup Plus portable’s layout. This layout is called a file system. And it’s how a Windows PC understands what’s written on and to the Backup Plus drive.
NTFS is a file system your Mac can read. You can copyfiles off your Backup Plus onto your Mac. But you can’t update any of the fileson the drive.
Your Mac sees a Seagate Backup Plus as read only.
And you can’t use a NTFS Backup Plus as a place tostore your Time Machine backups.
Luckily, you’re not stuck with that file systemforever.
You can change it. And formatting it is a way you canput on a file system your Mac can read and write to.
Help! My Seagate Backup Plus Doesn’t Appear on theDesktop or in Disk Utility.
There are a few answers to this. One of these will bethe issue.
1. You may have a problem with the USB software on the USB port you’re using on your Mac. Try plugging into another port.
2. The previous device you had on that USB port may not have ejected properly.
A restart of your Mac will reset the software driveron your Mac’s USB port.
3. You might have a broken USB cable. Try a USB cable you know works.
4. Put your Backup Plus on a Windows PC to see if you can see it there. It may respond to be being formatted on a Windows PC and then your Mac can see the drive.
5. You may be unlucky and have a corrupted Seagate Backup Plus drive.
How Do I Password Protect or Encrypt the Files on MySeagate Backup Plus
When you format your Seagate Backup Plus you canchoose to set up a password. You can do this as well as encrypting yourportable.
You do this by clicking on the Security option. It’s onthe Disk Utility window where you put in the settings for your formatting.
Watch Out!
You’ll find this software feature very secure on aMac.
Even the FBI has problems accessing Mac data that hasbeen secured.
If you lose your password you will have a sad face fora very long time.
Seagate For Mac Driver
Last Words
I hope you enjoyed my article How to Format SeagateBackup Plus for Mac Help! Don’t Freak Out.
And you stopped freaking out and you’refeeling nice and calm about it. So calm you’re going to do it on the SeagateBackup Plus you have. Go on I dare you.
In no time you’ll have your Seagate BackupPlus working on your own Mac.