Format Thumb Drive Mac Command Line

 

To format your USB drive on Mac, enter the following command: sudo diskutil eraseDisk FORMAT VOLUME-NAME USB-LOCATION-AND-NAME Where: FORMAT is where you choose which format you want to use when erasing and formatting your pen drive. There are many file types available when you format a USB drive on Mac, such as exFAT, FAT32, JHFS+, etc. If you want to use your USB stick with an Apple Mac, you will need to restart or power-on the Mac with the USB stick inserted while the Option/alt (⌥) key is pressed. This will launch Apple’s ‘Startup Manager’ which shows bootable devices connected to the machine. Connect the USB flash drive to your computer. To do so, plug it into one of your Mac's USB ports, which resemble thin, rectangular slots on your computer's housing. Some Macs don't have USB ports, so you'll need to purchase an adapter.

  1. Format A Thumb Drive Mac
  2. Format Thumb Drive Mac Command Line Download
  3. Format Thumb Drive Mac Command Lines
  4. Format Thumb Drive Mac Command Line Command

If you’re still using a Mac OS X the time will come when your computer won’t boot, or a problem may arise where you can’t take control of the device, and booting from an OS X installation media will be required.

This is why it’s recommended that you make a Mac OS X bootable USB when your Mac is in working conditions. However, if you find yourself on a scenario where your device (iMac, MacBook Pro, Air, Mac Pro or Mini) is not responding and you happen to have a Windows 10 device, then you can still be able to make a USB bootable installation media for your Mac OS X to reinstall the operating system using the Recovery Assistant.

  • That’s it, you know how to format a USB drive on Raspbian Desktop 🙂 If you don’t already have a partition on your drive, it’s the same process (as simple as right-click new) Raspbian Lite and command line. As usual, the Raspbian Lite way is less straightforward 🙂 Find the virtual drive name.
  • Start off by running the following command in the command line: Diskutil list This is going to list all the mounted drives on your Mac. Once you have found the proper drive to erase, just copy its identifier so you can use it for the next command. Then pick a name and a system format type.

These instructions will also work for Windows users who are running Mac OS X on a virtual machine and need to upgrade to the latest version. For instance, to OS X Yosemite.

Requirements

Before you dive into this guide, you’ll need a few things:

Drive
  • A broken Mac computer with Mac OS X.
  • A trial copy of the TransMac software.
  • One high quality USB flash drive with 16GB of storage.
  • A copy of Apple’s macOS (DMG file).

Now that you have all the necessary ingredients, you’re ready to make a Mac OS X bootable USB using the DMG file of the operating system with the steps below.

Create Mac OS X bootable USB installation media

Before you can use TransMac, you first need to partition your USB flash drive with a GPT partition, as a normal MBR partition may not work. To do this, you’ll need to use the Diskpart command-line utility on Windows 10.

Setting up GPT partition

Use these steps to set up a USB drive with a GPT partition:

  1. Open Start on Windows 10.

  2. Search for Command Prompt, right-click the top result and select the Run as Administrator option.

  3. Type the following command to open Diskpart and press Enter:

  4. Type the following command to determine the USB flash drive and press Enter:

  5. Type the following command to select the storage and press Enter:

    Quick tip: The select disk 1 command as an example, but you have to replace 1 with the number of the flash drive you want to use.

  6. Type the following commands to delete everything from the USB thumb drive and press Enter:

  7. Type the following command to convert the drive into a GPT partition and press Enter:

  8. Type the following command to select the new partition and press Enter:

Format A Thumb Drive Mac

After you complete the steps, the USB flash drive from MBR to GPT format, you can use the steps below to create a bootable USB installation media to install Mac OS X.

Create USB install media

Use these steps to create a bootable media to install Mac OS X:

  1. Download and install a copy of TransMac.

    Quick note: TransMac is a paid software, but it has a 15-day trial solution, that give us more than enough time to move the DMG files to the USB drive from Windows. (If you want to support the developer, you can purchase the full version.)

  2. Insert the USB drive that you’ll use to fix your installation of OS X. (Remember that all the data in the USB will be erased. Make sure you take off any important documents.)

  3. Right-click the TransMac software icon and Run as administrator. (You’ll be prompted to Enter Key or Run, because we’ll be using it once, click the Run option.)

  4. On the left pane, you’ll see all the Windows PC drives listed, right-click the USB drive that you’re intending to use to reinstall Apple’s OS X and select the Restore with Disk Image option.

  5. In the warning dialog box, click the Yes button.

  6. Use the Restore Disk Image to Drive dialog box to browse for the DMG file with the installation files for Mac OS X Yosemite in this case, and click the OK button to create a bootable USB of the operating system.

    Now, you’ll have to wait a long time. No kidding. It could take one or two hours to complete the process depending on your computer and other variables.

Once your bootable USB installation media is ready, remove it and insert it into your Mac, power it on, holding down the Option key, and select the USB you just created to reinstall Mac OS X.

If you’re having issues trying to create a bootable media, you can get a USB flash drive that comes with Mac OSX ready to install.

Bootable USB Installers for OS X Mavericks, Yosemite, El Capitan, and Sierra

Format Thumb Drive Mac Command Line Download


First, review this introductory article: Create a bootable installer for macOS. Second, see this How To outline for creating a bootable El Capitan installer. Simply replace the Terminal command with the one from the preceding article by copying it into the Terminal window. You will need an 8GB or larger USB flash drive that has been partitioned and formatted for use with OS X.


Drive Partition and Format

  1. Open Disk Utility in the Utilities' folder.
  2. After Disk Utility loads select the drive (out-dented entry with the mfg.'s ID and size) from the side list.
  3. Click on the Erase tab in the Disk Utility toolbar. Name the drive, 'MyVolume'. <---- IMPORTANT!
  4. In the drop down panel set the partition scheme to GUID. Set the Format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.)
  5. Click on the Apply button and wait for the Done button to activate. When it does click on it.
  6. Quit Disk Utility.


Create Installer

Open the Terminal in the Utilities' folder. Choose the appropriate command line (in red) depending upon what OS X installer you want. Paste that entire command line from below at the Terminal's prompt:


Command for macOS High Sierra:

sudo /Applications/Install macOS High Sierra.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia --volume /Volumes/MyVolume --applicationpath /Applications/Install macOS High Sierra.app

Command for macOS Sierra:

sudo /Applications/Install macOS Sierra.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia --volume /Volumes/MyVolume --applicationpath /Applications/Install macOS Sierra.app

Command for El Capitan:

sudo /Applications/Install OS X El Capitan.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia --volume /Volumes/MyVolume --applicationpath /Applications/Install OS X El Capitan.app

Format Thumb Drive Mac Command Lines

Command for Yosemite:

sudo /Applications/Install OS X Yosemite.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia --volume /Volumes/MyVolume --applicationpath /Applications/Install OS X Yosemite.app

Command for Mavericks:

sudo /Applications/Install OS X Mavericks.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia --volume /Volumes/MyVolume --applicationpath /Applications/Install OS X Mavericks.app

Format Thumb Drive Mac Command Line

Format Thumb Drive Mac Command Line Command


Press RETURN. You will be asked for your admin password. It will not echo to the Terminal window. Then press RETURN again. Wait for the return of the Terminal prompt signifying the process has completed. It takes quite some time to finish. Be patient.

Sep 13, 2018 1:16 PM