- In computing world, DMG or (Disk Image File) is a file extension that belongs to Mac OS X. DMG file can also be termed as Apple Disk Image. The icon used equivalent to this file is an Internal Hard-drive. Disk Images are generally used worldwide in-order to distribute applications and software across the Internet.
- The usage of the DMG file extension is in the context of a mountable disk image file which is generated by the Mac OS X Operating System platform. Once the file is opened, the system will mount it in a virtual disk located on the user's desktop.
Aug 13, 2018 DMG files include something called a checksum, which basically verifies that the file is 100% intact. This is what you see when the file is opening: This little window first goes through a phase of verifying the file, and then once it’s sure the file is good, moves on to decompressing it. Dec 13, 2019 While Windows devices use.exe files in order to “execute” an action, Mac OS has its own special file types that allow it to perform all sorts of tasks. For example, a.pkg file can be installed to your MacBook or iMac, while a.dmg file allows you to clone existing drives in order to move information and other content around between machines.
Open DMG File
DMG is used for disk image files on Macintosh computers running Mac OS X. This file extension replaces the older file extension IMG which was discontinued during the release of later series of Mac operating systems. You can open DMG file on Mac, Linux, and Windows operating systems but it will require additional software to be installed on Windows. Note that on Windows and Linux you cannot open every DMG file, since there are certain software limitations on DMG format variation.
DMG files are used by Apple for software distribution over the internet. These files provide features such as compression and password protection which are not common to other forms of software distribution file formats. DMG files are native to Mac OS X and are structured according to Universal Disk Image Format (UDIF) and the New Disk Image Format (NDIF). They can be accessed through the Mac OS Finder application by either launching the DMG file or mounting it as a drive.
DMG is also referred to as the Apple’s equivalent to MSI files in Windows PC. Non-Macintosh systems may access DMG files and extract or convert them to ISO image files for burning. Several applications are designed to offer this solution for Windows systems.
What Is A Dmg File Type
7-Zip and DMG Extractor are the best options to open DMG file on Windows because they are compatible with the most DMG variations. For Linux a built-in 'cdrecord' command can be issued to burn DMG files to CD's or DVD's.
Aside from the Finder application, you can open DMG files through Apple Disk Utility, Roxio Toast, and Dare to be Creative iArchiver for Mac platform. On the other hand, additional applications such Acute Systems TransMac, DMG2IMG, and DMG2ISO can be installed on Windows to fully support the files.
Read how you can open DMG files on Mac OS, Windows and Linux.
DMG files are transferred over e-mail or internet using application/x-apple-diskimage multipurpose internet mail extensions (MIME) type.
Following file types are similar to DMG and contain disk images:
What Is A Dmg File Format
- ISO File - ISO disk image file
- IMG File - IMG disk image file
- VHD/VHDX File - Virtual Hard Drive image file