Question HFS+ or APFS for HDDS (formatting from NTFS)

[rcgrph7702]

Hello,

I have a Seagate Exos 7E10 10TB and Exos 7E8 4TB both are formatted to NTFS as I used them on windows before. Now I am planning to shift to macOS.

Both drives have data in them, I am planning to shift the data of these 2 drives and format them to APFS or HFS+ for macOS.

I have done some research and found that APFS is bad for HDD. So should I format these HDDs to HFS+?

I will be using these HDDs for general work and occasional backup. I will be regularly accessing these HDDs.

I have them connected to my Macbook Air M1 via a Stardom i310-B31 HDD enclosure.

I also regularly defragment these drives on NTFS on Windows, so moving forward to macOS how do I do this?

Please guide me thank you.

 

[PiersPlowman]

Either file system should work, though APFS is newer and conceived with solid state drives in mind.

Why not do some research of your own and try both file systems to see which one works the best?

 

[rcgrph7702]

Either file system should work, though APFS is newer and conceived with solid state drives in mind.

Why not do some research of your own and try both file systems to see which one works the best?

I have checked online. A lot of them suggest HFS+ for HDDs
Since APFS is better suited to work on SSDs and will cause stress for HDDs

 

[PiersPlowman]

I have checked online. A lot of them suggest HFS+ for HDDs
Since APFS is better suited to work on SSDs and will cause stress for HDDs

My understanding is that HDDs do not perform as quickly with APFS, but, APFS has native support for drive encryption. Assuming these are removable drives, that might be something to consider. Otherwise, HFS+ is fine.

 

[rcgrph7702]

My understanding is that HDDs do not perform as quickly with APFS, but, APFS has native support for drive encryption. Assuming these are removable drives, that might be something to consider. Otherwise, HFS+ is fine.

Understood thank you. So maintenance like defragmentation is not necessary with hfs+ on macOS? Like with NTFS on windows?

 

[PiersPlowman]

It has been a while since I used a Mac, but IIRC defragmentation was transparent to the user. However, I think there was a tool for checking journal corruption... But as I said, it was a long time ago.

MacOS tends to take care of itself.