SOLUTION 1 - Format in exFAT exFAT file system that allows a single file larger than 4GB to be stored on the device. This file system is also compatible with Mac. Windows 7 and Mac OS 10.6.6 and higher are compatible with exFAT out of the box. Older operating systems may need a patch installed for exFAT compatibility. Nov 01, 2018  As you'll all be aware there can be issues with format when using a flash drive in both a Mac machine and a Windows one, and for some reason I'm getting the message in the title if the file is over 4gb when copying. I presume this to be because the current format only allows for files under a Certain size to be copied to it.

I could have sworn that Disk Utility lets you format volumes as 'MS-DOS format', which is in fact FAT32. Check out the 'Volume Format' menu choices in the Erase tab.

Can't Be Copied Because It Is Too Large For The Volume's Format Mac

In Apple's DISK UTILITY, if you take one extra step, it should work for most devices that need to see a FAT 32 HDD ... this works on a 500GB and 1 TB HDD ...
Select Partition with ERASE tab in Disc Utility - Select 1 Partition, then bring up ADVANCED and select the FAT 32 Choice and mounting as a DOS selection. Then Select FAT 32 as the Partition choice.
ERASE/PARTITION - should work.

It is also untrue that WinXP cannot create FAT32 volumes greater than 32 GB. Of course it can.

According to the MS support website, you cannot format a partition larger than 32 GB in XP, though it is able to support partitions larger than 32 GB.
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=http://support.microsoft.com:80/support/kb/articles/q314/4/63.asp&NoWebContent=1

Disk Management only lets you create FAT32 partitions up to 32GB; anything larger must/should be NTFS.
The only way to create a larger FAT32 partition within XP is to use 3rd party formatting tool.
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SilverKeeper

Actually, no, by default windows XP will not let you format any drive over 32Gb on Fat32, you have to get a utility to do it. you cant even do it in dos, here's the printout if you try.
C:>format I: /fs:fat32 /q
The type of the file system is FAT32.
Enter current volume label for drive I: MyCrap
WARNING, ALL DATA ON NON-REMOVABLE DISK
DRIVE I: WILL BE LOST!
Proceed with Format (Y/N)? y
QuickFormatting 76319M
The volume is too big for FAT32.
C:>

Be very careful with fdisk! It will do EXACTLY what you ask it to do, even if you ask it to destroy your data. One typo can ruin your whole day.
Disk Utility is a much better choice unless it is completely incapable of doing what you need.

FAT32 can't store file larger then 4GB-1, which makes it pretty much useless for me because I cannot save DVD images or large backups on it. So I just bought macdrive and installed it on all my windows boxes - not that flexible, but now I can read/write HFS+ volumes right from windows and it's freaking fast with firewire drives (faster then PowerBook G4 1Ghz, to be honest) plus you get an access to mac formated iPods from windows. Apple should distribute this program as part of Mac OS X and iPods :)

Have you had any problems since installing MacDrive? A coworker of mine has it on his XP box, and ever since, his AV software has failed to download and install updates. Just wondering if you'd encountered any odd side effects of using the MacDrive software.
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osxpounder

I don't have an XP, only windows 2000 and with this system macdrive never created a single problem for me. I'm using it with two different firewire drives (with different bridging controllers) and iPod. If you have doubts I'd suggest to download a trial version and try it.

In addition to this problem noted, also be aware that other version of OS X, namely 10.2.x, cannot mount a FAT32 formatted disc with a volume larger than 128GB; anything larger will not mount.
If drive is used on an OS 9 system, there can be data corruption on any volume larger than 32GB.
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SilverKeeper

Um, why not simply format it as MS-DOS format in Disk Utility? I know in older versions of OS X, this would only format as FAT16, but in 10.3.4 at least, MS-DOS format formats as FAT32.

Do you have to use the command line to get disk utility to format MS-DOS? In the GUI version of Disk Utility for 10.3.4 there are only the options of Mac OS Extended and Mac OS Extended (Journaled) in the format menu.

The Volume Is Too Big For Fat32

It's all nice being able to format large FAT volumes but how are can I mount one? I have a 30GB drive with a USB interface which must be FAT formatted (It reads memory cards and stores them on it's disc) and my PowerBook just won't mount it. When I plug it in, an icon comes up after some time and I can look at the drive but when I try to copy anything from it, I never get a progress dialog and nothing ever happens until I pull the plug.

Hi, this was a very helpful hint for me. Also, notice that you can use disk utility to partition the disk, and only newfs the partition you want (you don't have to make the entire disk fat32, I like to have an HFS+ partition as well).
Also, I couldn't get the partition to mount following the instructions. Finally I tried
$ mkdir Desktop/pcdisk
$ mount_msdos /dev/disk1s7 Desktop/pcdisk/
you must be running as root to load modules into the kernel
mount_msdos: msdos filesystem is not available
$ sudo mount_msdos /dev/disk1s7 Desktop/pcdisk/
Password:
kextload: /System/Library/Extensions/msdosfs.kext loaded successfully
which worked, and explains why I couldn't get Disk Utility to mount the volume: the msdos filesystem kernel module was not loaded. This has the disadvantage that automounter is not taking care of the mounting and dismounting, when I'm done, I will want to remove the mount directory and such. I was hoping that after doing the above step I could unmount and then get disk utility to mount it properly, now that the kernel module was loaded, but no such luck.

the first part of my comment above doesn't work. If you partition the drive with your mac, the PC won't be able to read it. I suspect something about incompatible partition tables. I have only been able to make the PC read the drive if I format the entire drive as 1 FAT partition.

This tip didn't work for me. The 's#' suffix number was different for me, some other stuff went wrong, but anyway I didn't investigate much further.
I CAME HERE because I was a bit too slow to figure out how Disk Utility was supposed to do it and eventually concluded it couldn't do MS DOS/FAT format... I kept clicking on my volume (which was the problem) and it didn't give the option to format with MS-DOS, the FAT32 option.
If anyone else is as peculiarly challenged as me and thinks there isn't much of a difference between Disks and Volumes, know that in order to format large FAT32 disks, you have to click on the *Disk*, which is the mother node that says '##.# GB QAZWSX123 Media', not the Volume below it, with your much more euphonic volume label on it. And voila, there's the MS DOS option. And a lot of other things I was missing.
Hope this helps.

This is due to FAT32 limitation. Files larger than 4GB can NOT be stored on a FAT32 volume. Formatting the flash drive as exFAT or NTFS will resolve this issue.
WARNING: Backup your data. Formatting will delete all the data in your device.
SOLUTION 1 - Format in exFAT
exFAT file system that allows a single file larger than 4GB to be stored on the device. This file system is also compatible with Mac.

Cannot Be Copied Because It Is Too Large For The Volume's Format Mac

Windows 7 and Mac OS 10.6.6 and higher are compatible with exFAT out of the box. Older operating systems may need a patch installed for exFAT compatibility.
NOTE: exFAT file system is NOT compatible with some host devices such as TV, game systems, older operating systems, car stereos etc.
Formatting a drive in exFAT
1. Double-click on My Computer.
2. Right-click on the flash drive or memory card, then select Format.
3. In the File System list, click exFAT.
4. Click Start.
5. Click OK to start formatting.
Click Here for Instructions to format with Mac

SOLUTION 2 - Format in NTFS
WARNING:
- Formatting the device as NTFS will make it unwriteable on a Mac computer. Most Mac computers can read NTFS, but not write.
- NTFS is a journaled file system, this creates more read/write activities. Therefore, it MAY decrease life expectancy of your device.
- Once the device is formatted as NTFS, you MUST use 'Safely Remove Hardware' to remove your device.
STEP 1 - Optimize the flash drive for performance
1. Plug in the device to the PC.
2. Open The Computer Management Console
a) Windows 8
b) Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7
3. On the Left side selectDevice Manager
4.On the right side expandDisk Drives
5. Right-click on the flash drive, then select Properties.
6. Click the Policy tab.
7. Select Optimize for performance, then click OK.
STEP 2 - Format the flash drive
1. Double-click My Computer.
2. Right-click on the flash drive, then select Format.
3. In the File system list, click NTFS.
4. Click Start.
5. Click OK to start formatting.