Hi, I want to buy “WD My Passport for Mac 4TB USB-C”. My question is: Is this HD likely to work on devices with build-in media players (not mac devices)?
Background info: When I plug a simple USB stick (with any kind of video content) into my Samsung TV (UE49KU6400), it plays any kind of vid with the build-in media player. I wonder if this will also work for this WD Hard drive. I realize no-one can probably answer this question for this specific combination of products, but maybe someone has experience with WD HD drives for Mac on devices such as this Samsung TV.
Appreciate your answer!
Thanks,
Michael
Because a simple USB stick works won’t guarantee a large Hard drive will.
USB sticks (which are flash memory) require less power than a hard drive (which is a spinning mechanical disk)
USB sticks are usually FAT32/MBR (Master Boot Record) Partition Style
Large Hard drives can be NTFS/exFAT/HFS/HFS+ (GPT) GUID Partition Table … need to check your TV user manual to see what file system(s) it supports and what partition table. (if it only supports MBR then you’re limited to 2TB hard drives).
(example: my Panasonic 4K UHD TV supports, NTFS/exFAT & FAT32 file systems, also supports both MBR/GPT… and My Passport 4TB and 2TB drives work fine.)
In summary, there’s no guarantee it will work on your Samsung TV … If you had a dedicated Media Player connected to the TV via HDMI, then the chances are a lot better (eg. my Raspberry Pi 3 with Kodi works with anything plugged into it eg. flash drive, hard drive. phone, sd card reader etc etc)
Thanks so much for taking the time to answer me, Joey. Appreciated!
Just checked the manual of my Samsung TV, and it says:
- it only support ‘Mass Storage Class’ (MSC)
- it does support FAT-, exFAT- and NTFS
Does the MSC (I think that is the partition) rule out external hard drives such as the WD My Passport for Mac?
(I understand I will only know for sure once I try)
MSC is a USB Device Class and not a Partition Type Table.
Found this on the Samsung site (which doesn’t sound good)
● 2TB maximum storage
and then
● A Smart TV may not recognise a 3TB or 4TB hard drive. Re-partitioning the hard drive to 2TB in a PC may be detectable and read by the TV.
There’s also the issue of Power … The Samsung TV might not be able to power a 4TB USB Drive without using external power (powered usb hub)
My Panasonic 4K TV has 3 USB Ports … 2 for Charging/Low Power Devices and 1 for Hard Drives for Recording and Playback. (this is where i plug my 2TB/4TB USB drives into, and they work fine. They will NoT Work in the other 2 USB ports.)
