New to Mac External Hard drive Question

We are switching from a PC to a Mac, we need to save file on an external drive. My business software has to run on Windows though Parallels. My question is, can I save my windows based file and my mac file on the same external drive? I was told I had to format the drive to my mac and if I plugged it into my PC it would wipe out all my files. I am confused but saving both types of files on one external drive.

 

you have a couple of options. you can either format the drive with 2 partitions. one for windows and one for the mac. you won't be able to read/write a windows file to the mac partition and vice-versa but you won't have to deal with file system compatibility. if you want to read/write files from the mac to/from windows, etc. you'll want to format the drive in a way that's compatible with windows. i usually go with one partition formatted as exFAT which can be read/written by windows and OS X.

http://lifehacker.com/5927185/use-the-exfat-file-system-and-never-format-your-external-drive-again

** formatting a drive with existing data will erase all of the data on the drive. so make sure you backup all of the files before formatting **

 

This solution may be of some help:
http://www.mactip.net/guide-how-to-...th-macs-and-pcs-without-third-party-software/

 

I'm using 2TB drive formatted in exfat without any issues on Linux/Mac/Windows