Another question from a switcher

[minibill]

I have a Seagate free agent 2tb external hard drive that has been used some to back up a windows machine. It has 1.76tb free space on it. Can I use this hard drive to back up my Mac Mini or do I need to get another hard drive? If I can use it, how hard is it to get the HD set up to use? Thanks!
Bill

 

[pigoo3]

That hard drive probably needs to be wiped & reformatted to use with Apple computers. Once reformatted...using it with your Mac-Mini for backups is easy.

- Nick

 

[Slydude]

Yes you can use that drive but you will have to reformat it. This should get you started.

1. Before you do anything else backup any files that you need from that drive. Reformatting the drive is going to erase its contents.
2. These directions explain how to use Disk Utility to format the drive and prepare it for backup. The video is talking about backing up a startup drive but the same principles apply.