Reformatting HD?

[avx]

I was under the impression that when you buy a new HD you must format it, and that it can take AWHILE, but my friend built his first sytem about 2 weeks ago, and he said he never remembers formatting the HD, It was a WD 80gig, he says he never formatted it, do they sell them pre-formatted? Or can you actually just install it and not need to reformatt it? Can it cause problems in the future if you do it like that..I believe his HD was OEM also.

Thanks for the help guys

avx

[Kubie]

avx487,
I don't agree that his new hdd came formatted. How would the mfg know if the end user is using FAT32 or NTFS?
Carl

[foghat46]

I have yet to install a hard drive that I didn't have to format. I hate to ask this question, but does your friend understand the meaning of format? He may have run the disk utilities to set it up.

[reboot]

He may also have installed the OS by booting to the CD, or booting to a startup disk, and running Setup directly from the CD, in either case it would default to fdisk and format the drive, almost without him even knowing it.
All you need to do is hit Enter a couple of times during the setup.

[Jomama]

When you install a windows OS (from a CD) it will prompt you about the format. If you arnt paying attention and just keep "OKing" it will partition the whole disk and format it then install the OS.

[avx]

Well I didnt mean to imply that it came pre-formatted, I actually was wondering if it was even a possibility, I didnt think it would be, but I was told that an 80gig HD would most likely take a while to format, he didnt give me a time from, just a while, whats "a while"? I just looked it up at webopedia.com and I found this paragraph:

"Hard disks have a low-level format, which sets certain properties of the disk such as the interleave factor. The low-level format also determines what type of disk controller can access the disk (e.g., RLL or MFM).

Almost all hard disks that you purchase have already had a low-level format. It is not necessary, therefore, to perform a low-level format yourself unless you want to change the interleave factor or make the disk accessible by a different type of disk controller. Performing a low-level format erases all data on the disk."

This desfinition would lead me to believe that I dont have to format my HD, but you guys seem to agree that you need too. Now Im getting confused...someone break it down please...wheres glc at???

thanks, avx

[edit] just saw you post reboot. So formating a disk actually doesnt take long at all? And yes, he most likely just hit enter a bunch of times, so he most likely did format it wihtout him even knowing(it was WinXP home if it makes any difference). I know for a fact that he did boot from CD, cause we had a problem with that and he had to set "Boot from CD" in his BIOS.

[mattg2k4]

There two types of formatting, the low level format, which is what you defined. Then there is the high level format, which is typically FAT32 or NTFS. Formatting an 80gb drive doesn't take long really, it's been a while since i formatted mine, but it didn't take more than 10 min I believe. The speed, 7200 or 5400 typically also makes a difference.

[raftero]

when you buy a new hd it is clean,when you boot from cd using the os it will format the disk like jomama said just oking it when it ask.this is the simple way.it isn't excessivly long even on an 80g hd.

[avx]

ok I see...that clears my misconceptions up even an 80gig can be formated in about 10 mins...He probably was just OKing everything and didnt even notice it.

Now, one more question, can you format a drive without an OS CD, and how would you go about doing it? BIOS? and how long would it take?

Thanks guys

avx

[minsonngo]

You can format it using a bootable floppy made from Windows 95, 98, or ME. As long as it has FDISK and FORMAT on it. FDISK is used to partition the harddrive. And FORMAT is used to format the harddrive. You can also use the operating system already present on a harddrive to format another harddrive. You simply hook up the unformatted harddrive and boot the computer up to the operating system. You then format it using the OS. Windows XP also has partitioning capabilities. I am not sure if the older operating systems like 95 or 98 have the partitioning feature. Last you can also use third party software to format a harddrive. Programs like Partition Magic are really good.

[reboot]

Mostly right minsonngo. You can format a drive with ANY boot disk containing the correct command. It could be FAT, FAT32, NTFS, 'Nix, CP/M, the list goes on...
Just because MS has a monopoly on operating systems at the moment does not mean that there aren't other formats out there.
Not all OS disks will contain a format command, yes, most Windows disks do.