No Luck attempting to Format a USB Hard Drive

[drybones]

Hello,

These very old and drybones are having bit of a problem formatting a USB
External Hard Drive.
Running Windows XP SP2 Media 2005 and am the administrator as well as the
only user
of the machine.

My Computer shows the USB Drive as, "Local Disk (F. File system Raw. Right
clicking on this
Drive Icon brings up the option to Format as well as others. Next window
appears as "Format
Local Disk ...?".

Capacity 298 GB / File System NTSF. I choose Allocation size 512 and named
the drive,
USB Backup and enabled compression.

Want to utilize Norton Ghost 10 with this drive.

New window appears, "Format Local Disk (F" with the usual warning on
erasing. The New
USB HD light goes on and all seems well.

After much time and activity, I get a new window that says,
"Windows was unable to complete the Format", OK.

Anyone know the solution to this problem?

Thanks for reading and hopefully replying.

drybones

 

[Uwe Sieber]

512 Bytes allocation size is no good idea. It at least causes
a lot of overhead. The default value of 4096 is perfect and
might solve the problem too.


Uwe

 

[Anna]

Hello,

These very old and drybones are having bit of a problem formatting a USB
External Hard Drive.
Running Windows XP SP2 Media 2005 and am the administrator as well as the
only user
of the machine.

My Computer shows the USB Drive as, "Local Disk (F. File system Raw.
Right clicking on this
Drive Icon brings up the option to Format as well as others. Next window
appears as "Format
Local Disk ...?".

Capacity 298 GB / File System NTSF. I choose Allocation size 512 and
named the drive,
USB Backup and enabled compression.

Want to utilize Norton Ghost 10 with this drive.

New window appears, "Format Local Disk (F" with the usual warning on
erasing. The New
USB HD light goes on and all seems well.

After much time and activity, I get a new window that says,
"Windows was unable to complete the Format", OK.

Anyone know the solution to this problem?

Thanks for reading and hopefully replying.

drybones

drybones:
I wonder if it wouldn't be wise to kind of start over here. Why don't you do
this...

After connecting & powering up your USB external HDD and booting up with
your internal HDD, access Disk Management and use that utility to delete any
or all partitions on that USBEHD, create a new one (or multi-partition if
you have any interest to do so), and finally format that drive.

I'm assuming you know how to access DM and furthermore know how to use that
program to partition/format a HDD. If you don't, so indicate and I'll walk
you through the steps. You can, of course, use XP's Help and Support for
info & instructions on how to use that program.
Anna

 

[Brian A]

Did you Partition the disk before attempting to format it?

--

Brian A. Sesko { MS MVP_Shell/User }
Conflicts start where information lacks.
http://basconotw.mvps.org/

Suggested posting do's/don'ts: http://www.dts-l.org/goodpost.htm
How to ask a question: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/555375

 

[drybones]

Hello to all you nice folks who responded.

I see that a 512 bite allocation was a bad idea. I thought that to diminish
fragmentation
the smaller bite allocation was better?

I believe I goofed on the partitioning part. Did not even cross my mind. I
would think
that I could utilize my Partition Magic 8.0 program (floppy disks) to do a
partition of
the new hard drive.

Golly, what 77 years does to the brain waves. Shrinks them I suppose. <grin>

As for the Disk Management, well I must admit that I have never had the need
to utilize
it so not sure how to get there. Suppose thru the Admin?

But then I must still make the disk a NTFS and what about the actual byte
size?

Brian, you GOT ME! <grin

Thanks Uwe, Anna and Brian for being so nice.

drybones

 

[Anna]

Hello to all you nice folks who responded.

I see that a 512 bite allocation was a bad idea. I thought that to
diminish fragmentation
the smaller bite allocation was better?

I believe I goofed on the partitioning part. Did not even cross my mind. I
would think
that I could utilize my Partition Magic 8.0 program (floppy disks) to do a
partition of
the new hard drive.

Golly, what 77 years does to the brain waves. Shrinks them I suppose.
<grin>

As for the Disk Management, well I must admit that I have never had the
need to utilize
it so not sure how to get there. Suppose thru the Admin?

But then I must still make the disk a NTFS and what about the actual byte
size?

Brian, you GOT ME! <grin

Thanks Uwe, Anna and Brian for being so nice.

drybones

Disk Management is accessed through Start > right-click My Computer > Manage

Computer Management > Disk Management

When you access DM why don't you click on the Help icon just below the menu
bar and peruse on the Help files for detailed information about using DM,
including partitioning & formatting a HDD?
Anna

 

[Brian A.]

Hello to all you nice folks who responded.

I see that a 512 bite allocation was a bad idea. I thought that to diminish
fragmentation
the smaller bite allocation was better?

I believe I goofed on the partitioning part. Did not even cross my mind. I would
think
that I could utilize my Partition Magic 8.0 program (floppy disks) to do a
partition of
the new hard drive.

Golly, what 77 years does to the brain waves. Shrinks them I suppose. <grin>

As for the Disk Management, well I must admit that I have never had the need to
utilize
it so not sure how to get there. Suppose thru the Admin?

But then I must still make the disk a NTFS and what about the actual byte size?

Brian, you GOT ME! <grin

Nah, you got youself, I just helped with the kickstart.

Thanks Uwe, Anna and Brian for being so nice.

drybones

You're quite welcome. Enjoy and good luck.


--

Brian A. Sesko { MS MVP_Shell/User }
Conflicts start where information lacks.
http://basconotw.mvps.org/

Suggested posting do's/don'ts: http://www.dts-l.org/goodpost.htm
How to ask a question: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/555375