HELP - external drive permissions

Just got my new Macbook - yes, I am a switcher. I had an external drive I used with Winblows...now when I hook it up to the macbook, it says I only have read permissions (on the whole disk). I noticed it is using the NT file system. How do I change the permissions so that I can read and write to the disk. Does it have to do with the file system as I suspect? Help, I am clue-less.

OS X can only read the NTFS file system. You can back up your files somewhere and then reformat the drive with Disk Utility.

timswim78 said:

OS X can only read the NTFS file system. You can back up your files somewhere and then reformat the drive with Disk Utility.

Click to expand...

Hey, welcome to the fold. As stated above, OS X can only read NTFS, however OS X can read and write the previous PC file format called Fat32. I also use an external HD with my Macbook that must be read/write capable with both OS X and Windows. I used Partition Magic on a PC to convert my external HD to Fat32 from NTFS. This can be done without having to reformat the drive and without losing the data on the drive. I'm sure there are other utilities available for the Mac that can do the same. I'll have a look and if I find something, I'll post it in another reply.

Again, Welcome.
Brian.