This tip is pretty much noob-proof because it does definitely not involve any system hacking, it is just about installing a few apps. I have done my test and have been using this solution for a few months now on my two external hard disk, which are two Lacie Bigdisk 500GB.
This tip has been fully tested to work under Mac OS X 10.5, however it should work fine in older Mac OS X’s. You just have to install the appropriate app version.
Let’s look at how you can take FULL control on NTFS partitions from your Mac.
This is actually very simple. Install the following apps in order.
1) MacFUSE – http://code.google.com/p/macfuse/
look for MacFUSE-Core-10.5-1.5.1.dmg if you’re using Leopard, and MacFUSE-Core-10.4-1.5.0.dmg if you are using Tiger.
2) NTFS-3G – http://macntfs-3g.blogspot.com/
the latest blog post should provide you the very latest version with download link, i.e. the latest version is 1.2531 at time of writing.
The installation for both of these apps should be plain simple and straightforward.
Whoa-la! After installing both these apps you should be able to Read and Write data onto your NTFS partition.
Notable limitation of the NTFS-3G partition: deleting stuff will not move them to the Trash, you will be prompted to permanently delete them.
March 12th, 2009 at 3:20
Hi, I tried doing as written here, but after installing all the software and plugging in the external hard drive, a dialog box pops up saying that there is not full compatibility, and asks if I want the disk to unmount, or force it to mount. I tried unmounting and trying again, and it did the same. It seems to work when forcing to mount, but it warned that this could corrupt data. Any Ideas?