TransMac Help

Features:

Apple File System (APFS) volume read support.

Open Mac APFS/HFS/HFS+ format disk drives, flash drives, CD/DVD/Blu-ray media.

Open Mac APFS/HFS/HFS+ format disk image files (dmg, dmgpart, sparsebundle and sparseimage).

Encrypted disk image support (full version only).

Copy files to Mac HFS+ disks and dmg images.

Format as HFS+ for Mac.

Save and restore images of disks and flash drives.

Create, compress, expand and split dmg files.

Built in burner functionality to burn ISO and dmg files directly to CD/DVD/Blu-Ray.

Read Mac multisession and hybrid CDs.

View partition layout.

WARNING: After formatting or attaching a Mac disk, Windows may display a window offering to format it. DO NOT SELECT FORMAT OR DATA ON THE DRIVE WILL BE LOST!
Windows does this because it does not recognize Mac format disks. Just cancel that window without formatting and run TransMac.
Click the drive in the left pane of the TransMac window. You can then browse the drive and copy files from within TransMac.

Below are instructions for performing some common operations in TransMac.

Navigation Tips:

TransMac works like File Explorer. Select disks, disk images and folders in the treeview pane on the left. Contents of the selected treeview item are displayed in the listview pane on the right. Most operations can be performed with the right-click context menus.

Treeview navigation:

• Right click on treeview items or in an open area to display a pop-up menu of valid operations.
• Click or use up and down arrow keys to traverse the folder tree.
• If a drive has been added since TransMac was run, right-click in an open area and select "Refresh Drive List".
• Check the partition info and size of a disk by right-clicking and selecting "Properties".
• Check the size of a volume or container by right-clicking and selecting "Properties".

Listview navigation:

• Right click on listview items or in an open area to display a pop-up menu of valid operations.
• Press letter keys repeatedly to cycle through items starting with that letter.
• Press Ctrl-A to select all items in a list box.
• Select a group of items by clicking on the first item, scrolling to the last item, then holding down the "Shift" key while clicking on the last item.
• Select non-consecutive individual items by holding the "Ctrl" key while clicking on them.

Select a drive in the treeview pane and click on a Mac volume.

Browse the Mac volume for the files to be copied.

Drag them from the listview pane to a File Explorer window or other drop target. (An alternate way is to right-click the items in the listview pane and select "Copy to")

NOTE: For copying large files it is best to use the "Copy to" method instead of drag and drop since it does not copy to a temp folder first.

Select a drive in the treeview pane and click on a Mac volume.

Browse to where files are to be copied.

Drag files from a File Explorer window or other drag source to the listview pane. (An alternate way is to right-click an open area in the listview pane and select "Copy here")

Open a volume and browse to where the new folder is to be created.

Right-click an open area in the listview pane and select "New Folder". (An alternate way is to press the  button)

Enter the name of the folder and press OK.

Open a volume and browse until files/folders to be deleted are shown in listview pane.

Right-click and select "Delete". (An alternate way is to press the  button)

CAUTION: Deleting a folder will delete all sub folders inside it as well.

Open a volume and browse until files/folders to be renamed are shown in listview pane.

Right-click and select "Rename". (An alternate way is to select the file/folder then click the name in the listview)

Edit the name in place then press Enter or click outside the name. Press escape (Esc) to cancel and revert to the original name.

Open a volume and browse for the file to preview in the listview.

Double-click the item to preview. (An alternate way is to right-click and select "Open")

The file will be opened using the PC application associated with the file type or extension.

To open a file in notepad, right-click and select "Open as Text".

To open with a different application, right-click and select "Open with". You will be prompted to select an application.

NOTE: When opening a file from a Mac disk, TransMac copies it to a temporary folder on the PC. Any changes to the file will NOT be written to the Mac disk.

By default the TransMac installation program associates Mac disk image files (.dmg and .sparseimage extensions) with TransMac so double-clicking those files should open them in TransMac.

To explicitly open disk images with other extensions select "Open Disk Image" from the file menu or right-click an open area of the treeview pane and select "Open Disk Image".

The disk image file should now show up in the treeview pane. Clicking the file should open it if it contains a valid Mac volume.

Select "New Disk Image" from the file menu or right-click an open area of the treeview pane and select "New Disk Image".

Enter the desired volume label.

Enter a volume size in megabytes.

Press OK and you will be prompted to browse for the destination folder and file name.

Right-click the dmg file in the treeview pane and select "Compress".

Enter the destination file name in the "Save As" dialog.

Right-click the dmg file in the treeview pane and select "Expand".

Enter the destination file name in the "Save As" dialog.

NOTE: Some types of dmg compression like bzip may take a long time to expand.

Right-click the dmg file in the treeview pane and select "Split". Note: Only compressed dmg files can be split.

Enter the number of segments.

You will be prompted for the destination file name. The first file has a .dmg extension. The other files have the extension .NNN.dmgpart where NNN is a sequence number (002, 003, 004, etc.).

Right-click a drive in the treeview pane and select "Format Disk for Mac".

You may be prompted to restart TransMac as administrator.

Enter the desired volume label and press OK.

CAUTION: Make sure you want to format the disk. Any existing data on the disk will be destroyed.

Right-click a drive in the treeview pane and select "Restore with Disk Image".

Press the "..." button to browse for the disk image to be written. Valid compressed dmg files will automatically be uncompressed as they are written.

CAUTION: Make sure you really want to over write the disk. Any existing data on the disk will be destroyed.

NOTE: Restoring a large dmg file to a flash drive may take a long time. Flash drive write times vary greatly but are usually much slower than reading. Compressed dmg files will also add time. You may be able to save time by expanding ahead of time (see Expanding Dmg above).
When restoring a disk image, TransMac does not modify the dmg to make it bootable or change it in any way other than decompressing. Apple has published some OS install dmg files that are bootable but many are not and need to be run on a Mac to make a bootable flash drive.

Right-click a drive in the treeview pane and select "Save Image of Disk".

Select the location for the saved image file.

Select "Burn CD/DVD" from the "Tools" menu or right-click the .dmg image in the treeview and select "Burn to CD/DVD".

Select the burn drive.

Press the "..." button to browse for the dmg file to be burned.

Click OK to start the burn process.

NOTE: Compressed dmg files will add time. You may be able to save time by expanding ahead of time (see Expanding Dmg above).

Since TransMac has an internal burning functionality, it can burn any ISO or CD/DVD image file.

Select "Burn CD/DVD" from the "Tools" menu.

Select the burn drive.

Press the "..." button to browse for the ISO file to be burned.

Click OK to start the burn process.

Follow the directions for "Creating a disk image" above. Be sure to select dmg for the image type.

You can save burn time by creating a smaller volume, but it can not be enlarged once it is created. The volume size should not be greater than the capacity of the target media. A CD-R has a limit of about 650-700 MB. A DVD-R has a limit around 4.7GB. To use the full capacity of the media select the drive in the "Get size from CD media" box to read the size from inserted media.

Open the disk image and copy the files and folders you want on to be on the CD.

Right-click the dmg in the treeview pane and select "Burn to CD/DVD". (An alternate way is to select "Burn CD/DVD" from the "Tools" menu)

Select the burn drive.

Press the "..." button to browse for the dmg file to be burned.

Click OK to start the burn process.

NOTE: If  TransMac's CD burning capabilities are not working with your drive, try selecting Use alternate burning method in the Tools/Settings menu under the DVD/CD Burning tab.

Select "Erase CD/DVD" from the "Tools" menu.

Select the burn drive.

Click OK to start the erase process.

Symptom: The message "No Mac HFS volumes found" appears when selecting a Mac disk or dmg.
   Problem: The disk is not Mac APFS, HFS+ or Standard HFS formatted.
        Solution: TransMac can only open Mac APFS, HFSX, HFS+ and (Old) Standard HFS format disks and dmg files. Right-click the drive and select "Properties" to see the partition layout and type of volume.

Symptom: An error message appears while copying files.
    Problem: Windows has a legacy file path size limit of 255 characters.
        Solution1: Rename folders with smaller names or copy inner folders separately so they fit within path limit.
        Solution2: Select the "Allow long paths for Copy to PC" checkbox in the Settings dialog. This setting may cause problems with legacy Windows programs that don't support long paths.
    Problem: File is too large for the target file system.
        Solution: Make sure file is less than 2GB for PC FAT16 file system and less than 4GB for PC FAT32.
    Problem: Disk has bad sectors.
        Solution: Use a different disk, reformat disk or fix disk by running a check for bad sectors on a Mac.

Symptom: Some listview context menu items (Copy Here, Delete, New Folder, etc.) are greyed out.
    Problem: The disk is write protected or read only.
        Solution: For hardware write protect, turn protect switch off.
        Solution: Dmg files are read-only when compressed. Expand the dmg to write to it.

Symptom: An error message appears when trying to write to a disk.
    Problem: The disk is write protected or read only.
        Solution: For hardware write protect, turn protect switch off.
    Problem: Disk has bad sectors.
        Solution: Use a different disk, reformat disk or fix disk by running a check for bad sectors on a Mac.

Symptom: An error message appears when formatting a disk.
    Problem: The disk is write protected
        Solution: For hardware write protect, turn protect switch off.
    Problem: Disk has bad sectors.
        Solution: Use a different disk, reformat disk or fix disk by running a check for bad sectors on a Mac.

Symptom: A file copied from a PC is not recognized on the Mac.
    Problem: The Mac does not have an application installed that can open the file type.
        Solution: Some file types are the same on both machines (jpg, gif, mp3, etc). Some files can be opened with the same application on the opposite platform. For example a file created on a Mac with Quark can usually be opened on a PC if it has the PC version of Quark installed. For some files there is no application that will open them on the other machine.

Symptom: A file copied from a Mac is not recognized on the PC.
    Problem: The PC does not have an application installed that can open the file type.
        Solution: Some file types are the same on both machines (jpg, gif, mp3, etc). Some files can be opened with the same application on the opposite platform. For example a file created on a Mac with Quark can usually be opened on a PC if it has the PC version of Quark installed. For some files there is no application that will open them on the other machine.

Symptom: Files are corrupt after copy.
    Problem: The file system on the disk is corrupt.
        Solution: Use a disk checking utility (on a Mac), or reformat the disk (if there is no needed data on it).

Symptom: After restoring a dmg/iso image, the destination USB drive is not bootable or does not work properly.
    Problem: TransMac save/restore are very simple raw transfer functions that work like Unix dd. TransMac does not modify the dmg to make it bootable or change it in any way other than decompressing. Apple has published some OS install dmg files that are bootable but many are not and need to be run on a Mac to make a bootable flash drive.

Symptom: Restoring a dmg file to flash drive is slow.
    Problem: USB flash drives are optimized for reading. Writing may be very slow especially for older drives. Compressed dmg files are expanded on the fly which will also add to restore time.
        Solution1: Use a newer/faster flash drive.
        Solution2: Use a recent version of TransMac. The buffer size has been expanded in recent versions of TransMac for faster decompression.
        Solution3: Expand the dmg file before restoring.

Symptom: After restore, flash drive capacity is too small.
    Problem: Restoring will overwrite the partition map with whatever is in the disk image. Windows may only format a partition but not the partition map.
        Solution: To revert back to the original size, the incorrect partition map must be overwritten. In Windows use TransMac "Format Disk for Mac" operation and eject, then re-insert the drive and Windows should prompt to format (if not prompted, open Windows "Disk Management" window to format drive). An internet search will reveal other ways to do this in Windows or other operating systems.

Symptom: Get error message while or after burning disk image to DVD.
   Problem: If image is a compressed dmg, it could be corrupt.
        Solution: Try expanding dmg to verify integrity.
   Problem: DVD failed verification.
        Solution1: Try selecting "Use slowest burn speed" in Options/General Settings.
        Solution2: Try different media or drive.

To run TransMac once as administrator, right-click on the TransMac shortcut or icon and select "Run as administrator".

To always run TransMac as administrator, right-click on the TransMac shortcut or icon and select "Properties".

Then tick "Run this program as an administrator" under the "Compatibility" tab