Formatting a Disk

Formatting a disk writes the file system, the low-level structure information needed to track where files and folders will be located on the disk. Generally, you need to format disks only when you want to clean off a floppy disk or other removable disk for reuse, if you repartition your hard disk and create a new partition, or if you have a disaster with Windows and want to reinstall it from scratch. CD-R and CD-RW disks don't need to be formatted before use.

Caution  

Formatting a disk-hard disk or removable-deletes all the information from the disk, so proceed with care!

Formatting a Hard Disk

Before formatting your hard disk (or one partition on a hard disk), be sure you make a backup copy of any files you want to keep (see Chapter 9). To format a hard disk, follow these steps:

1. Open the Computer window and locate the drive you want to format.

2. Right-click the icon for the drive and choose Format in the menu that pops up. You see the Format dialog box, shown in Figure 34-5. Almost none of the fields in the window, except for the volume label, apply to hard disks-leave them with their default settings.

3. Type a drive label in the Volume Label box (if the box is blank or if you want to change the existing label) and click the OK button in the Format dialog box.

4. If the drive contains files or folders, Windows asks whether you really want to reformat the disk, because existing files will be lost. Assuming you want to format the disk, choose Yes to do so. Formatting can take several minutes-the process involves reading the entire disk to check for bad spots.

Note  

You can't format the disk from which you are running Windows; Windows displays an error message saying the disk contains files that Windows is using. You can't format a CD-ROM either.

Formatting a Removable Disk

Formatting a removable disk (like a CD or DVD) is like formatting a hard disk, except more format options are available. If you only want to erase the files on a previously formatted disk without rechecking for bad spots, select Perform a Quick Format in the Format dialog box shown in Figure 34-5. Then click the Start button in the Format dialog box.

When you format a disk, Windows may report bad sectors on the disk. Windows marks the sectors as unusable, to prevent programs from trying to write information there. If a floppy disk has any bad sectors, throw it away and use a new one-floppy disks are too cheap for you to fool around with the possibility of losing data.