Three ways to format a hard drive using built-in Windows tools. Proper formatting of a hard drive How to format a portable hard drive
There are two types of failures of external hard drives, these are: damage caused by mechanical impact on the external hard drive, in which some elements of the device fail. Of course, it is almost impossible to correct such a malfunction with your own hands. Another type is failures of such equipment, which are most often associated with power outages. You can solve this problem yourself using regular formatting.
Standard formatting method
You can use standard Windows operating system software to format your hard drive. To do this, you need to connect the external drive to your computer and then open it. Next, in an empty space, you need to right-click and select “Format”. Here the user will have access to two systems: FAT 32 and NTFS. It is advisable to use the first one if files of a size not exceeding 3.5 GB will be stored on the hard drive. The second system is used in all other cases. After selecting the system, you need to click on the “Full formatting” button and start the procedure. Upon completion, you can again check the hard drive for functionality and if it still does not work properly, you will need to use other software.
Formatting a hard drive using special software
For example, one of the best utilities, proven over the years, is Acronis Disk Director. It is distributed absolutely, which means it can be easily found on the Internet. After installation and launch, you will need to select the manual mode of working with the program. A special window will open in which absolutely all disks installed on the computer will be displayed. The user needs to select an external hard drive and click on the “Format” button. Here you will also need to select a file system from NTFS or FAT32 according to the criteria described above.
You can also use the HDD Low Level Format program to format an external hard drive. It is worth noting that this software is best suited for “advanced” personal computer users, since its interface is not so easy to understand. This utility performs low-level formatting of various devices, even those connected via a USB cable. It works with SATA, IDE and SCSI HDD. After launching this software, the user just needs to click on the LowLevel button located at the very top, select the formatting section, and then click on the Format This Device button.
I suggest that before you start changing the file system, look at what file system is currently used on the USB storage device. To do this, go to " My computer"/ "Computer" / "This computer" (respectively in Windows XP, Windows7, Windows8) right-click on the flash drive / external hard drive and select " Properties". In the properties window you will see the file system of the device.
Attention!!!
Formatting/changing the file system is a process that deletes all the files and folders on a storage device, so before starting this process, you need to transfer all the data to another media.
Formatting/changing the format of a USB flash drive or external hard drive using the Windows interface.
For this method, you need to insert the USB storage device into the computer/laptop open " My computer"/ "Computer" / "This computer" (respectively in Windows XP, Windows7, Windows8). Right-click on the device that needs to be formatted and select " Format".
In the formatting window, in the line File system select the required file system (NTFS, FAT32, exFAT). The remaining parameters can be left as default. Click " Begin".
A warning window will appear stating that all folders and files from the media will be deleted, click " OK".
After a few seconds, a window indicating successful formatting will appear.
At this point, the procedure for changing the file system of USB devices/formatting can be considered complete.
Formatting/changing the format of a USB flash drive or external hard drive using the Windows command line.
For this method, you need to launch the command line, to do this, click the " Start" or press the keyboard shortcut
A command prompt will open. here we have to use the FORMAT command to format the USB device.
FORMAT command syntax:
FORMAT volume
FORMAT volume
FORMAT volume
FORMAT volume
FORMAT volume
volume Specifies the drive letter (followed by a colon), mount point, or volume name.
/FS:filesystem Specifies the file system type (FAT, FAT32, NTFS, or UDF).
/V:label Volume label.
/Q Quick formatting. Overrides the /P option.
/C NTFS only: Sets the default compression mode for all files created on the new volume.
/X Initiates dismounting of the volume as a first action, if necessary. All open handles to the volume will be invalid.
/R:edition UDF only: Formatting in the specified UDF version (1.00, 1.02, 1.50, 2.00, 2.01, 2.50). The default version is 2.01.
/D UDF 2.50 only: Metadata will be duplicated.
/A:size Overrides the default cluster size. In general, it is recommended to use the default cluster sizes. NTFS supports sizes 512, 1024, 2048, 4096, 8192, 16 KB, 32 KB, 64K. FAT supports sizes 512, 1024, 2048, 4096, 8192, 16 KB, 32 KB, 64 KB, (128 KB, 256 KB for sector size > 512 bytes). FAT32 supports sizes 512, 1024, 2048, 4096, 8192, 16 KB, 32 KB, 64 KB, (128 KB, 256 KB for sector size > 512 bytes). exFAT supports sizes 512, 1024, 2048, 4096, 8192, 16 KB, 32 KB, 64 KB, 128 KB, 256 KB, 512 KB, 1 MB, 2 MB, 4 MB, 8 MB, 16 MB, 32 MB.
The FAT and FAT32 file systems impose the following restrictions on the number of clusters on a volume:
FAT: number of clusters<= 65 526
FAT32: 65,526< число кластеров < 4 177 918
The FORMAT command will abort immediately if a violation of the above restrictions is detected using the specified cluster size.
NTFS compression is not supported for clusters larger than 4096.
/F:size Indicates the size of floppy disks to be formatted (1.44)
/T:tracks The number of tracks on each side of the disc.
/N:sectors Number of sectors on each track.
/P:times Zeroes each sector of the volume the specified number of times. This option has no effect with the /Q option
/S:state Where "state" can be "enable" or "disable" 
An external hard drive is a compact device that provides the ability to store copies of data and transfer large amounts of information from one device to another. The advantage of an external HDD is the use of a USB interface, which allows you to conveniently connect the device to any tablet, laptop and PC. Its remaining parameters are similar to a regular computer hard drive.
Despite the advantages of conventional hard drives, the device also has disadvantages. When working with an external HDD, users may have the following problem: the disk cannot be accessed and it needs to be formatted. Let's look at the causes of this problem and how to deal with it.
To organize and store information on any type of storage device (external hard drive, flash drive, hard drive), you need to apply a set of special rules determined by the location and method of storage. This is a specific set of software that provides access to information in a convenient form for various applications. The most popular file system now is NTFS. It is also used on external hard drives.
Damaged or missing file system
When viewing information about an external drive to which access is prohibited and if it is necessary to format it, you can see that the NTFS file system has become RAW. This indicates a missing or damaged file system on the disk. Often the data itself remains intact.
Not all users know that in addition to recorded files, there are special file identifiers on the HDD. They contain information about the file type, its size and other attributes. This method of organizing information storage can be compared with a table. There is a key and the data itself, and they can be accessed by using a specific identifier. If the key column disappears, it will be quite difficult to gain access to specific information. This occurs when the disk file system is damaged.
Options for solving the problem when the external hard drive does not open
The easiest way to return the file system to an external drive is to use the standard CHKDSK command type:
- The command line is launched (press Windows + R, enter “cmd” in the field that appears and click “Run”).
- A console will appear in which to write the command “CHKDSK disk_name: /f”. In disk_name, enter the name of the external drive that has the RAW file system.
- This method copes with minor damage to the file system. There is a risk of losing some data.
There are applications that provide file system recovery on disk. The most popular is GetDataBack. The utility recovers all data without loss.
If these two methods do not work, and the external drive still does not open and asks for formatting, then you need to format the hard drive. Quick formatting will not result in data loss. Information in the form of zeros and ones will remain on the disk, but access to it is lost. There are applications that help restore this information. Conventional formatting completely deletes information, but solves the problem with accessing the external hard drive.
Formatting using Windows
The following steps are required:
- Connect the external hard drive to your computer and open the My Computer window.
- After the system detects the hard drive and it appears in the “My Computer” window, you need to open the context menu of the external drive and select “Format”.
- A window will then open showing the disk formatting settings. Here you need to select a file system, specify the disk name and enable the quick format function.
It is better to choose the NTFS file system. FAT has a large number of limitations, and under modern conditions it has become frankly outdated. Using the Quick Format feature will create a clean file system without physically deleting files from the external drive.
If you disable the quick format feature, this process may take several hours. The volume label is optionally set. After setting the required parameters, you need to click on the “Start” button. Then a window opens with a warning about deleting all existing data on the disk being formatted. Once the formatting process is complete, the external drive will open again and be available for use.
Formatting via the command line
You can format your external hard drive using the command line. To do this, connect the disk and launch the Windows command line.
Disks are formatted using the FORMAT command. To find all the parameters that this command accepts, just enter "FORMAT /?".
To format an external hard drive, you need to run the FORMAT command with the following parameters:
- /Q – enables the quick formatting function.
- /V:MyDisk – indicates the name of the disk. You can use any other name instead of MyDisk.
- /FS:NTFS – formatting using the NTFS file system.
To format an external hard drive, you can use this summary command: FORMAT X: /FS:NTFS /V:MyDisk /Q. Here the letter X represents the name of the external drive being used. When formatting using the command line, it is important not to mix up the drives.
There are no additional warnings displayed during the disk formatting process using the command line, so you need to be careful.
Formatting via Disk Management
Windows OS has a handy tool called Disk Management. Its functions include formatting disks, creating and deleting partitions, as well as performing other operations. To access this tool, you need to open the “Run” menu and enter the command “diskmgmt.msc”.
After opening the window, the following steps are performed to format the external hard drive:
- Search for an external hard drive and open its context menu (right mouse button).
- Selecting the “Format” item in the context menu.
- The user is shown a warning about deleting all data from this disk. To start formatting, click on the “Yes” button.
External hard drives are very convenient and useful devices. If a situation arises when the external hard drive does not open and asks for formatting, then you can solve the problem yourself. Just follow the instructions given above in the article. To prevent incidents of information loss, you can copy important data to other storage media.