Transferring files from pc - mac?

just make sure it is formatted to like Fat32...........

An external drive can be compatible with both Mac and PC, BUT, it all depends on how it's formatted.

Here's a quote from another forum.

I have successfully done what you are trying to do - I had a USB/Firewire combo enclosure that I put a hard drive in and formatted it using Disk Utility as MS-DOS (FAT32). I have no problem using the Firewire connection for the mac and USB 2.0 for the PC.

As far as NTFS, your mac should be able to see and read any NTFS partition, just not write to it. You should be able to read and write to FAT32 drives and Disk Utility can even repair FAT32 if necessary.

Instead of using Partition Magic to format FAT32, have you tried any other utilities? (Disk Manager in XP, Disk Utility in OS X, etc.)

You should just be able to plug it in, and if it doesn't work, install Skype on both of the computers and transfer the files overnight (when you're on the same network on Skype, it transfers at about 3 MBPS). Than, once you've transferred all of the files that you need,format the external hard drive. Here is a description on how to format a hard drive in Mac OS X (the same technique for Leopard also works in Snow Leopard).