Angry jump drives: PC to Mac-drive not recognized

[chris23892]

Ok..pulling my hair out here..so before I get involved in the problem, let me tell you what I am doing and what I have.

       I have Software for a Mac that I have on my PC. I want to either burn that onto a DVD or throw it on a jump drive to transfer to the Mac. Problem is none of my jump drives are recognized on the Mac.

What I have:
1.) My laptop is running vista 64-bit
2.) jump drives (I've tried both jump drives and flash USB) formatted to NTSF, FAT32- non of which worked on the Mac

Friends Mac:
1.) running OSX 10.2.8
2.) when I plug my jump drive into the mac, it says it has a volume that the OSx can not read.
3.) Tried to partition the jump drive on the Mac with the OSx drivers, but them my PC will not recognize it.

DVD:
I burned the SW apps for the Mac using my PC. DVD shows up fine on all PC's in the art studio. Put the DVD into a Mac and it sits there and does not recognize it.

I never had this problem a few years ago. We all swapped jump drives between macs and PC with absolutly no problems.

What has changed and how do we fix this? There has to be a way to put information on a DVD/jump drive on my PC and have the Mac recognize it.

Any help/thoughts would be great!
Thanks!

[mayers57]

Mac OS X will read and write to FAT 16 and FAT 32, and can only read from, but not write to NTFS volumes. It would be best to format the jump drive to FAT32 on the Windows PC, doing a full (not quick) format. Just in case you did a quick format.

[chris23892]

I tried them both. The mac still will not pull it up. It tells me that it sees a vilur that it can not read and wants to format it with MAc

Again, here are the steps I've taken:
1.)On the PC, I've formatted the jump drive to FAT 23
2.) wait 10 minutes for the slow thing to format
3.)plug the USB jump drive into the mac
4.) See intsantly the warning telling me that the drive is not recognized by the mac osx
5.) only otions are to ignore (which does nothing for the situation) or partition the unrecognized volume with the mac osx drivers (in which renders the drive useless to my PC)

I've tried three different drives, 4 thumb drives, 2 macs (my wife also has a mac) and tried this on 5 PC computers
The results have all been the same

[mayers57]

Couple of questions please:
1> Have you tried formatting these jump drives on a PC other than the Vista 64bit?
     Shouldn't be a concern but I'm not a Vista expert. I would try that if you haven't. You never know.
2> Have you tried formatting a jump drive on the MAC and taking it to the other MAC to verify
     there is no issue with the MACs reading jump drives.
3> You tried 4 drives on 5 PCs? All format by the Vista 64bit OS?
4> Are you sure you are virus / spyware free?
Just trying to get a feel for the issue. Trying to find the one common denominator here.

 

[chris23892]

Problem fixed.

What I had to do is format the jump drive on the Mac, choosing format type ms-dos operating system. It shows up now on the mac and the PC and I can see files now.

All my drives I have  formatted using a PC at some point in time. This works fine for PC;s, but the mac's do not like this at all.

Would anyone know why this is? I've used jumps drives many times with mac's and pc's with no issues. It's only when I do a full format using the PC is when they stop working on the mac's.

Thinking back, this is the common denominator: All the drives worked great BEFORE I formatted them (My jump drives and USB sticks I usually format once and awhile if they start to get flak)


Crazy computer world we live in.. Thanks for all the input!!And to answer the above questions:
1.) Tried this with win xp
2.) Mac has no issues seeing the drive when I format it using the mac
3.) Tried formatiing using both visa 32- bit, 64 bit and win XP
4.) No bugs/virus'

The only thing i can think of is windows is blowing away something the mac needs to see in the main volume header. formatting the drive on the mac using the option ms-dos operating system, seems to put this information back.

[mayers57]

Well glad to hear that everything is OK now. I'm not a MAC guy by any stretch, but choosing format type ms-dos operating system on the MAC sounds like FAT16 to me.  Like I said before, Mac OS X should read and write to FAT 16 and FAT 32, and can only read from, but not write to NTFS volumes. FAT32 should have worked on all the drives and PCs involved. It still would be worth investigating even though for now you have achieved your goal. 
Persistence, as on your part with this problem, always pays off.
The trick is to calmly try everything BEFORE you pull all your hair out.
Me, I end up grinding my teeth. I have only nubs left.  If you ever figure it out drop me a line. Always curious.
If I had to guess, it's on the MAC side.