Paragon Software release NTFS read/write driver for OSX

By default, OSX (both 10.4 and 10.5) can read NTFS partitions but not write to them. Some of us were hoping that NTFS-write would be included in Leopard but alas, no. Now thanks to Paragon, this limitation is removed. Well…almost.

Paragon Software (the makers of Partition Manager for Windows) have now released a read/write capable driver for Mac OSX, based on their previously released Paragon NTFS for Linux. The new driver allows OSX to natively read and write data to any Windows NTFS partition. This is particularly useful if you want to large files (greater than 4Gb) between Windows and Mac Systems via an external USB or Firewire drive. (e.g. Large Video files, Virtual Disk files, etc.)

The only ’supported’ mechanism currently is to use a FAT32 partition but with this File System type, individual files can be no larger by 4GB by design.

The new software can be downloaded from here, and allows a trial without registration for up to 10 days. The introductory purchase price is US$29.95.

I installed the driver on my Macbook and was pleasantly surprised at the performance (seems the same as HFS+ for my USB 2.0 drive) and tight integration with Disk Utility. It is definitely a more polished and professional delivery than my previous experience with the Open Source MacFuse and NTFS-3g.

Unfortunately, if you’ve upgraded to Leopard, the currently released software produces an error if you try to copy files over 4Gb to an NTFS partition. I logged a call with Paragon Support about this, and was promptly and pleasantly informed that:

“We have eliminated this problem on Tiger, and are working on fixing it in Leopard. The fix is already finished and is being tested at the moment. It will be released within a week with a free update. “

Apparently, all good things come to those who wait…

Update: The 4Gb bug with Leopard has now been fixed.