Windows PC for iMac Archives

Apple is becoming more popular everyday (I love my MacBook and it’s selling in record numbers this year), yet most people still have Windows PCs at home. If you are running both Macs and PCs on your network, there’s a good chance you might want to share files between your Mac and PC. You can do this in one of two directions: either access Mac files from a Windows PC or access Windows files from a Mac.

Today I’m going to talk about how you can share files on your Mac and access them on your PC. The process is fairly simple and should work as long as you are on the same network and don’t have any over zealous security settings configured on your Mac.

The first thing you’ll need to do is enable file sharing on your Mac. Here’s how to do it.

Enable File Sharing on Mac OS X

First go to the System Preferences menu option by clicking on the Apple icon at the top left and then clicking on System Preferences.

Now click on the Sharing icon, which is where we need to go to configure all the sharing options.

Before you get started, make sure to click on the little gold lock icon at the bottom left otherwise everything will be greyed out and you won’t be able to make any changes.

Now go ahead and check the File Sharing box under Service to enable file sharing. This one dialog pretty much contains all the settings and options for sharing. Starting at the top, you can change your computer name to something less complex so Windows users have an easier time connecting. If you don’t, OS X will give it a short name automatically so that Windows can recognize it. Click the Edit button to change the name.

You’ll also see the IP address for the computer listed by the Options button. Under Shared Folders, the Public folder is shared out by default. Click the little + (plus) button to share any folder on your hard drive. Under Users, you can see the standard permissions and edit them as you see fit.

The only other thing you have to do is click on the Options button and you’ll see a section at the bottom called Windows File Sharing. In order to connect from a Windows machine, you have to check the box next to the user name and enter your password. For whatever reason, OS X has to store your Mac user account password in a less secure way in order to connect from a Windows machine. If you don’t do this step, you’ll be asked to enter the username and password from your Windows machine, but it will just give you an error even if you type it in correctly.

That’s about it from the Mac side. Now it’s time to try connect from your Windows machine.

Connect to Mac from Windows

There are a couple of ways you can do this. One way is to simply open up Explorer and click on Network. You should see the Mac computer listed there.

If Windows asks you to enable Network Discovery, then go ahead and do that. Now when you double-click on the computer name, it should pop up a login dialog box. Enter the same username and password that you had entered in the Windows File sharing dialog on OS X earlier. If the user account on your Mac had spaces, don’t worry because Windows can handle it just fine.

If everything went well, you should see some shared folders now on your Windows computer!

Another way to connect is to use the Run command from the Start Menu. Click on Start, then Run and type in the IP address or computer name:

Now you’ll get the same dialog box where you have to enter the username and password for your Mac user account. You should now be able to copy files back and forth from Windows to Mac and vice versa.

The only setting that can cause issues is the firewall on OS X. Everything should work fine with the firewall enabled with default settings, but if you go to firewall and then Firewall Options, you can block all incoming connections. If this item is checked, then file sharing will no longer work.

Just uncheck that option under firewall options and you should be good to go. If you have any other trouble sharing your Mac files with your PC, post a comment and I’ll see if I can help. Enjoy!

One of the major hurdles in switching computers that is made even more difficult for users switching from a Mac to a PC, is moving your important files over. Both platforms have folders where you're supposed to store music, movies, photos and documents, but some files are harder to find than others.

Once you've finished moving these files over, Microsoft's Groove Music app will automatically import your songs, the Photos app will recognize your images, and all of your other files will sit where they belong. 

MORE: Windows 10: Full Review

Before you start, you'll need an external hard drive that works with Macs and PCs. If you don't have such a drive already, we've got instructions for formatting a drive to work with both kinds of computers.

How to Move Your Mac files to a Windows PC

1. Connect your external drive to your Mac, open the drive and select File.

2. Select New Folder.

3. Type Exported Files" and hit Return. Skip to Step 17 if you don't use Photos.

4. Open the Photos app and click Edit in the Menu bar.

5. Click Select All.

6. Click File.

7. Move your cursor to Export.

8. Select "Export Unmodified Original For ..." You can select Export Items, which gives you options for image kind and video quality, but most will want to select this option.

9. Click on the drop-down menu next to Subfolder Format.

10. Select Moment Name.

11. Select Export.

12. Click on your external hard drive.

13. Double-click on the Exported Files directory.

14. Click New Folder.

15. Type Photos and click Create.

16. Click Export Originals. This may take some time to finish, depending on how many images you've amassed. 

17. Open iTunes and right-click any song. If you don't use iTunes, skip to step 24.

18. Select Show in Finder.

19. Press Command + Up to move up to the Artist directory.

20. Press Command + Up to move up to the Music directory.

21. Press Command + Up again to navigate to the iTunes Music directory.

22. Click and drag the Music folder icon to your external hard drive in the side menu, and hold the mouse button down until the window shows the contents of the external hard drive.

23. Move the Music folder to the Exported Files folder and release the mouse button. The files will begin to copy, and depending on the size of your library, this might take some time.

24. Click on Go in the Menu bar.

25. Select Home.

26. While holding Command, click on Desktop, Downloads, Movies and Documents. Select additional directories if you want to bring them over.

27. Drag these folders to the external hard drive in the side menu, holding down on the mouse button until the window shows the contents of the external hard drive.

28. Move the folders to the Exported Files folder and release the mouse button.

Once all of your files have finished copying, the Exported Files folder should look like this, without any progress bars.

29. Click the Eject icon next to the external drive.

31. Connect the external drive to your PC and click the File Explorer icon.

32. Double-click the external drive.

Import a .pst file from Outlook for Windows

To help you transfer messages and other items from a Windows-based computer to a Macintosh computer, Outlook for Mac can import Outlook Data Files (.pst) that are created in Outlook for Windows.

1. Transfer the .pst file to your Macintosh computer.

2. On the Outlook for Mac File menu, click Import.

3. Click Outlook Data File, and then click the right arrow.

4. Select Outlook for Windows Data File, and then click the right arrow.

5. Locate the data file on your computer, and then click Import.

6. When the import process is complete, click Done.

   The imported items appear in the navigation pane under On My Computer.

Open an Outlook Data File (.pst or .olm)

You can import an Outlook for Windows Data File (.pst) or an Outlook for Mac Data File (.olm). These data files can contain large amounts of data of multiple item types. Outlook Data Files are frequently used as an archive or to transfer data between computers.

1. On the Outlook for Mac File menu, click Import.

2. Click Outlook Data File, and then click the right arrow.

3. Select a data file type, and then click the right arrow.

4. Locate the data file on your computer, and then click Import.

5. When the import process is complete, click Done.

   The imported items appear in the navigation pane under On My Computer.

   Note: Outlook for Mac can only import Unicode-based .pst files which are the standard format for Personal Folders files for Outlook (for Windows) 2003 and later versions. ANSI-formatted .pst files, also known as Outlook 97-2002 Personal Folders Files, were the standard personal folder format for saving data in Outlook for Windows in versions 97-2002. This file format can't be imported into Outlook for Mac. If you have the older version of ANSI-formatted .pst file, there is no automated procedure to convert that file to the newer file format. However, you can create a new Outlook Data File (.pst) in Microsoft Outlook for Windows 2003 or later, and then import items from the older file into the new file. You can then import the new .pst file into Outlook for Mac. For more information about how to create .pst files and importing items, see Help for your version of Outlook for Windows.

Open Entourage items from an archive or an earlier version

You can import items such as e-mail messages, contacts, and events from Entourage 2004, Entourage 2008, or Entourage 2008, Web Services Edition. You can also import from an Entourage archive, which has an .rge extension.

1. On the Outlook for Mac File menu, click Import.

2. Click Entourage information from an archive or earlier version, click the right arrow, and then follow the instructions.

   Notes:

   • If you used a Microsoft Exchange account with Entourage, all items in the Exchange account are downloaded from the Exchange server after the import process is complete. Any rules or schedules related to the Exchange account will need to be reconfigured in Outlook.

   • If you import items from Entourage 2004 or Entourage 2008, category information for items in an Exchange account aren't imported to Outlook. However, with Entourage 2008, Web Services Edition, category information will be downloaded from the Exchange server.

   • Outlook doesn't include Project Center. If you used the Project Center in Entourage and then import your Entourage information into Outlook, Project Center associations are converted to categories. For example, if you added items to a project that was titled "Research Paper" in Entourage, these items are assigned a category that is called "Research Paper" in Outlook.

   • Custom views, search settings, and event travel time information from Entourage aren't imported into Outlook. Outlook events don't include any travel time information.

Move an item from an archive folder to another folder in Outlook

1. Select the item that you want to move.

2. On the Home tab, choose Move, and then Choose Folder.

3. In the search box, enter the name of the folder that you want, and select Move.

   Tip: To copy an item from an archive folder to another folder in Outlook, simply drag the item to the folder where you want to place the copy.

See also

Import information into Outlook

Import iCal or Address Book items into Outlook

Export or manually archive Outlook items

Automatically archive or back up Outlook items