Will Leopad read & write on Windows partition?

Hi guys. Long time Windows user here, considering getting a macbook. I have too much windows software to switch completley, however, so it'll be parallels or bootcamp for me. I hear Leopard uses a new file system besides HFS+. Will this make it possible for Mac to read and write to an NTFS formatted partition? Will XP be able to read and write to the Mac partition? My main concern for not buying now is because I want to be able to use and modify all of my music, photos, videos, and documents from either OS, regardless of which partition they're on (although I suppose I can put them all on one partition if that helps). If Leopard solves this, I'm sold.

 

leopard might be able to read ntfs, maybe. don't hold your breath though.

i don't expect xp to be able to read hfs+ or any mac format any time soon.

(out of the box)

there are ways around this.

macdrive for xp/vista lets you read and write hfs+ (works great)

macfuse + ntfs-3g for osx lets you read and write ntfs (also works great AND its free)

 

OSX can already read ntfs- just not write. However, I heard Leopard won't be HFS+, but some new file system they got from Sun Microsystems. I was wondering if anybody knew how this'll change things up.

 

Leopard will most likely be HFS+, it's just that it will support ZFS from Sun Microsystems.
OS X can read and write to and from a NTFS partition if that partition is networked. So, an external USB NTFS drive which you just plug into your Mac will not be writeable, but if you plug that HD into a Windows box which you then connect to your Mac via LAN or something, your Mac will be able to write to that HD.

 

It will read ntfs. Tiger reads ntfs. It probably won't write to it. There is software for Windows like Macdrive that lets you write to the HFS+ filesystem. I'm not sure what OS X has for writing to Windows, but you should know that Parallels will mount your Windows drive network-style while the VM is running, if you want to go that route.