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Problem with writing to (NTFS-formatted) USB drives directly connected to your Mac? No more worries. You can solve the problem by enabling read-write (and delete) access to NTFS-formatted drives and flash memories.

It’s been 4 years since I wrote my post “Ability to write to NTFS volumes on the Mac” which presented a free solution to solve the problem to writing to PC drives (or deleting files from them) with NTFS-3G and MacFuse. However, after the release of Mac OS X Lion, and then OS X Mountain Lion shortly thereafter, the suggested free solution became obsolete as the development of the MacFuse driver has been halted, and there’s no longer any official support for newer versions of Mac OS X. A new piece of open-source software called OSXFuse driver was thought to come to the rescue, however even with OSXFuse, NTFS-3G does not function properly in Lion and Mountain Lion; you will still get mounting errors every time your computer boots. So you risk to corrupt your hard drive / SSD and end up with possible data loss.

Why can’t you write to some volumes on the Mac which you also use (read & write) on the PC?

Mac OS X uses a file system called HFS+, whereas Windows uses the FAT32 and NTFS formats (which stands for NT File System) for its drives used for storage. While Mac OS X can read files on NTFS volumes, it can’t write or copy files to them – this includes the Bootcamp partition on your Mac’s hard drive (or SSD), although it can both read & write on FAT32 disks and drives. FAT32 is heading toward its end of life cycle due to its limitations such as that you cannot format a FAT32 volume larger than 32 GB in size, and it cannot hold a single file larger than 4 GB. USB-memory drives with a storage capacity smaller than or equal to 4 GB are ideally formatted FAT32 with which you must be doing just fine on your Mac. However those that are larger have no choice but to have NTFS as their file system with which you’re gonna have this problem of writing on them on Mac OS X.

Fortunately, you can enable your Mac to write to NTFS writing on Mac OS X with relatively little trouble. Read more to find out about the low-cost solution which addresses the problem on Mac OS X Lion and Mountain Lion (aka Mac OS X 10.8).

Enter Paragon NTFS for Mac OS X

Paragon NTFS for Mac solves definitely the problem of mounting NTFS volumes as well as bringing the ability to read and write to those volumes flawlessly. A $19.95-solution from Paragon Software,  it is all you need in order to create, delete or modify any files on Windows NTFS drives (including your Bootcamp partition on your Mac if you installed Windows Vista or Windows 7 or later using the Bootcamp Utility) – and you won’t even remember there was ever a problem. Remove the barriers between NTFS and HFS with ease and confidence and no more worries about corrupting volumes and losing data.

Paragon NTFS has also been the first solution to support Mac OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion.

Paragon NTFS for Mac Screenshot

Key Features of Paragon NTFS for Mac

• Unprecedented high NTFS performance. The transfer rate is the same as with the native HFS file system!
• Full read/write/delete access to NTFS.
• Support for Mac OS X Leopard, Snow Leopard (32 and 64 bit), Lion and Mountain Lion
• Easy to install with a user-friendly installation wizard
• Easy to use. Mount any NTFS partition like a native one – no need to perform special commands to get access; just attach a disk or other media with NTFS partition and use it as you wish
• Create and repair NTFS partitions under Mac the same way you usually do with HFS/HFS+
• Support for Non-Roman characters and languages. File and folder names in national languages, including Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Russian and Turkish
  
• No limitation to maximum file/partition size (within Mac® OS X and NTFS specifications)
• Full-Support for NTFS features

• All NTFS versions are supported (from Windows NT 3.1 to Windows 7)
• Compressed files and folders
• Sparse files
• Files and folders with security permissions
• Additional utilities

• Format NTFS utility – formats any partition as NTFS under Mac OS X 10.5 and higher
• Check NTFS utility – checks NTFS partition integrity and fixes errors, creates and displays a status report about the NTFS file system
• Control NTFS utility – allows a user to control NTFS for Mac driver behavior

» Get Paragon NTFS for Mac here

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