What is Reddit's opinion of Disk Utility?

From 3.5 billion Reddit comments

Check what format your drive currently has on the Mac.

• https://support.apple.com/guide/disk-utility/welcome/mac

If it says HFS+ or APFS -- that's a Mac only format. You'll need to copy your files to a 2nd location, change the drive format to exFAT and then copy your files back to the drive.

If it says exFAT -- you're golden, the drive can already be used on both Mac and Windows.

https://www.cnet.com/how-to/so-youre-setting-up-an-external-hard-drive-formatting-facts-for-windows-and-mac/

Did you try disk utility first aid, after opening click on your hard drive and then click the first aid button. https://support.apple.com/guide/disk-utility/welcome/mac

I think the app you’ll want to use is Disk Utility. I’m once you open that (built-in) app, on the left side it shows what all is taking up your full memory.

On the left side there should be multiple “partitions” or “drives”. Check if one of them is taking up a ton of memory that may have been yours originally. The default name is something like Mac HD if I recall correctly.

Got it. Can you put the logs from the cli here? That should provide more information.

Also, please check how much _free_ space you have with Disk Utility: https://support.apple.com/guide/disk-utility/welcome/mac