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HDD Format

KezraPlanes

Just some dood
So I have this WD 1TB External HDD that had it's filesystem corrupted this week. So I backed up everything that was "save-able" and now I want to format it as completely as possible.

Weird thing is, if I try to format it using Windows (command line) it won't make a full format. I left the disk at home erasing data using KillDisk, but I'm afraid it won't work aswell.

Any ideas?
 

Hellcat

Contributor
You want to completely wipe the disk empty before reformat?

Here's what I do to do that (and I tend to do that a lot xD)

- get WinHEX and drop it onto a USB drive (or a HDD partition you're not going to format)
- boot up from Win Vista or Win 7 install DVD
- when the first splash of the Win install shows up press SHIFT+F10 to get a command window
- type "diskpart"
- type "list disk"
- see which of the disks in the now shown list is yours
- type "select disk N" with "N" being the number of the HDD to wipe from above's list
- type "clean"
- type "exit"
- CD onto the USB/HDD drive and folder holding WinHEX
- launch WinHEX
- open the physical drive of the HDD to be wiped
- Menu: "EDIT" -> "Fill Disk Sectors"
- "OK"
- wait.....
- wait some more....
- get a pizza
- some more waiting....
- DONE

works 100% for me
 

KezraPlanes

Just some dood
You want to completely wipe the disk empty before reformat?

Here's what I do to do that (and I tend to do that a lot xD)

- get WinHEX and drop it onto a USB drive (or a HDD partition you're not going to format)
- boot up from Win Vista or Win 7 install DVD
- when the first splash of the Win install shows up press SHIFT+F10 to get a command window
- type "diskpart"
- type "list disk"
- see which of the disks in the now shown list is yours
- type "select disk N" with "N" being the number of the HDD to wipe from above's list
- type "clean"
- type "exit"
- CD onto the USB/HDD drive and folder holding WinHEX
- launch WinHEX
- open the physical drive of the HDD to be wiped
- Menu: "EDIT" -> "Fill Disk Sectors"
- "OK"
- wait.....
- wait some more....
- get a pizza
- some more waiting....
- DONE

works 100% for me

Thanks :D I specially like the pizza part :D
 

Hellcat

Contributor
You're gonna need it, wiping a whole 1000GB disk may take.... "a while(1)" ;)

Esp. if it happens to be connected via USB, then it takes "while(1){while(1);}" xD
 

KezraPlanes

Just some dood
You're gonna need it, wiping a whole 1000GB disk may take.... "a while(1)" ;)

Esp. if it happens to be connected via USB, then it takes "while(1){while(1);}" xD

Yes, it is connected via usb xD
 

KezraPlanes

Just some dood
KillDisk is still doing the one pass zero erase. It's up to 10% since this 8am morning, this is gonna take a LONG time. At least its working
 

Seth

MD Party Room
When this happens I just use a live cd with gparted on it to format it, it does the job most of the time when windows fails.

gparted.sourceforge.net/

Or http://www.ubuntu.com/

Wont be as full clean as hellcats method but it works :)
 

KezraPlanes

Just some dood
Zero Erase is still at 17%... Damn thing is going to put my disk back to factory state xD
 

LocutusEstBorg

Active Member
"Full clean" is meaningless. You can't do anything remotely close to that on a modern HDD. You'll only be working on the logical level. If repartitioning in diskmgmt.msc followed by a format fails, the disk is damaged.
 

Hellcat

Contributor
@Torch:
Yeah, logical level, I think that all we're talking about.
Some ppl just like "completely (logically) empty" HDDs before filling them up again - at least I do :D
 

kathy025

Live fast. Die young.
If it doesn't full format pretty sure its got bad sectors.
+1

Just very recently, my Maxtor 1TB got some fatal bad sectors, won't let me access the disk at all. When I tried to format, it hangs even when I used special utilities. Actually when I plug it in the USB port and try to access My Computer, my laptop starts to hang.

What I did was:

1) Safe Mode w/ Command Prompt
2) chkdsk [drive letter:] /x (to force unmount and fix drive errors)

I was able to access my 1TB via Windows, I lost half of my data in the HDD though. T_T But at least its useable again.
 
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