how to partition an external hard drive for mac

Starting to get into the weeds with that one, but it would work as well. Then you would mount it, you’d want to use something like: – Connect the USB drive to the Mac again once the computer starts up, see if it mounts with the dialog again – if not, return to Disk Utility again and try to mount the partition, then File menu > Mount > UnlockĪnother option would be to manually mount the drive through the command line, which is quite a bit more advanced:įirst you identify the drive UUID (it’s a long hexadecimal string) for the encrypted partition: – Rebooting the Mac into Safe Mode (hold down Shift key on boot) If it’s not showing up, you could try the next step, it dumps some system caches and does a precursory disk check in the process: You should be able to select the drive in Disk Utility, then go to the ‘File” menu and choose “Unlock” on the encrypted partition. For maximum security, it’s best to leave that option unchecked.įor system-wide security measures, don’t forget to password protect a Mac with both login and screen saver passwords, and if you don’t mind the trade offs, to use FileVault to encrypt the entire hard drive and its contents.

That screen will look like this:Ĭlicking on “Remember password in keychain” will allow the drive to be mounted on the Mac without entering the password on that Mac, but it will still require a password to be used on another Mac. Once the drive has been ejected, connecting it again will require a password before it is even mounted. Eject the disk when finished to require a password upon further mounting and usage.

Let Disk Utility run, when finished the drives partition will show up on the desktop, the drive will be accessible for now without a password allowing files to be transferred over.

Set a hint that isn’t obvious and then click on “Erase”.

At the next screen, set a password – do not lose this password or you will lose access to the drives data.

Pull down the “Format” menu and choose “Mac OS Extended (Journaled, Encrypted)”.

Select the drive in Disk Utility, and click on the “Erase” tab.

Connect the drive you want password protected.Launch “Disk Utility” from /Applications/Utilities/.

Back up your data and all contents before proceeding, and do not lose the set password. Require a Password to Access External Drives with an Encrypted Partitionĭoing this will format the external drive and erase all of it’s contents.

How to partition an external hard drive for mac