I am planning on buying a 32 GB USB flash drive, so that I can transport my pictures back and forth from home and school. The problem is, at home I have a Mac, and at school the computers are PC. Is there anything special I will have to do to make my images work on both computers? I have access to a very high resolution scanner at school, and want to start getting all my old non-digital prints on my new Mac at home. Also, I do my editing on the Mac at home, but will want to print at school from the PC computers. Will this be a problem? Any suggestions?
Transporting between PC and Mac.
- Thread starter AbbyBee
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the flash drive will likely be formatted FAT32 when you buy it.
that's really all you need. osx and windows can both read/write/modify files on FAT32.
if it is not formatted FAT32, you can format it FAT32 on either a mac or a windows pc. keep in mind, as you move between the two types of computers, you're going to see the other system's "hidden" files like ".trashes" when you're on windows and "system volume information", "recycler" when you're on a mac. feel free to remove these, but they'll just keep coming back. as long as you keep emptying the trash before you eject on either system, they shouldn't be very large anyway.
that's really all you need. osx and windows can both read/write/modify files on FAT32.
if it is not formatted FAT32, you can format it FAT32 on either a mac or a windows pc. keep in mind, as you move between the two types of computers, you're going to see the other system's "hidden" files like ".trashes" when you're on windows and "system volume information", "recycler" when you're on a mac. feel free to remove these, but they'll just keep coming back. as long as you keep emptying the trash before you eject on either system, they shouldn't be very large anyway.
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- Your Mac's Specs
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AS for the photos, high quality Jpeg files will be fine to exchange between computers, or PNG 24 if you want lossless compression.
What photo software is on your mac, and what are you using on the PC?
What photo software is on your mac, and what are you using on the PC?
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Mac and PC computers share the ability to view most image files. For images you should be fine.
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If you save anything that isn't a compressed file, IE native PSD, or AI files make sure that you save them as legacy files. You will run into problems when you try to open them on an older version of the Adobe Suite or software.
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