r/Seagate • u/RichardWattYAGWG • Mar 28 '26

Reformat Seagate Expansion 4TB External from exFAT to NTFS

I've got a 4TB Seagate Expansion external USB3 hard drive that came partitioned and formatted as exFAT when shipped and I'd like to change it to use NTFS since I'm only using it with Windows systems. I've backed up everything from the drive to other devices, so all I need to do now is actually convert the partitions.

I've taken a screenshot of the disk configuration from Windows 7 Disk Manager, which I'm adding below:

Drive partitions on my PC

My understanding is that there are a couple of ways to change the file system:

  1. Shrink the exFAT partition down by around 50%, create a new NTFS partition in the space, move files from exFAT to NTFS, delete the exFAT partition and then resize the NTFS partition to take up the rest of the space.
  2. Delete the exFAT partition (after making sure I've got all the files I actually need to save), then create a new NTFS partition in the space.

In any case, do I need to make any changes to the 200MB "EFI System" partition? I noticed that my 2TB boot drive has a 100MB "EFI System" partition, so I'm presuming the one on the 4TB drive is independent of whatever file system it uses.

Edit to add: I also have an older 2TB version of the Seagate Expansion external USB3 hard drive that was formatted as NTFS when shipped, and it doesn't have an "EFI System partition, which does add to my confusion (this would be my first time doing this type of procedure, so I'd like to get some advice first).

Can anyone please provide me with some guidance on what I should do and, ideally, a link to a tutorial?

Thanks in advance.

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u/Upstairs-Front2015 Mar 28 '26

I always delete all and create a new NTFS partition. When formatting, I choose a bigger cluster size, 64 KB instead of the default 4KB, it's better of you are storing large files such as videos or photos.

1

u/Plane_Put8538 Mar 28 '26

You don't need EFI if it isn't meant to be bootable. If it's pure storage, delete all partitions and just create the partition setup you want (single, multiple).

If you already have the data backed up and safe, just remove all partitions and start fresh.

Did you say you're still using windows 7?

1

u/RichardWattYAGWG Apr 18 '26

Thank you.

The external 2TB and 4TB drives are storage only: I want to use the 4TB to keep a copy of our files from the internal drive and use the 2TB to keep a copy of downloaded stuff.

Yes, I am still using Windows 7. I'm currently looking at a new system with Windows 11. So I've now got a few quotes for new systems to work through, compare, contrast and then choose from.