Hard-Drive Formatting

[Tun@]

Got a new 1TB drive that i'm having to format,got it inside a USB connected external case and so far its only 30% thru formating in 3 hours of running.....is this normal?

Doing it thru Vista Home Prem's Disk Managment
Drive never appeared in Win explorer but was present in device manager so i'm assuming this was neccessary to kick it into life.

Shouldn't be taking this long should it?

 

[antowan]

Looks ODD to me. Something is not right. Maybe the USB is messing things up?

I would just check that it is moving from time to time... If it doesn't click a percent at least every 6 minutes then something is definitely wrong!

I would NOT have the patience for this though...

 

[HavocXphere]

Its fine, don't stress. USB connection limits the top write speed. Looks like you are doing a full format instead of a quick one (Which is not a bad idea for a bad idea for a fresh drive) so its basically filling the entire drive with zeros.

Quick calc (1TB*1024*1024=1048576, @~25mb/s = 11,6 hours)

 

[The_Techie]

It seems about right, 1TB will take a bit of time for a full format, as opposed to a quick format. As HavocXphere said, it's a good idea to do a full format for a fresh drive

 

[Tun@]

Ok thanks...yes doing a full format(read somewhere it was the thing to do)

The %age is moving...just slow, in no hurry so i 'll just let it tick over now i understand i don't need to stress on it.
Thanks!

 

[Tux]

It's the USB/Vista methinks
Did a 250gb for a client in a USB housing. took literally hours
Same type/size drive slaved on my XP box. Few minutes.

 

[feo]

Its fine, don't stress. USB connection limits the top write speed. Looks like you are doing a full format instead of a quick one (Which is not a bad idea for a bad idea for a fresh drive) so its basically filling the entire drive with zeros.

Quick calc (1TB*1024*1024=1048576, @~25mb/s = 11,6 hours)

HDD manufacturers quote capacities as 1kbyte = 1000bytes (not 1024) so that calculation should be:

(1TB*100*100=1000000, @~25mb/s = 11,1 hours)

 

[nocilah]

i am interested to know why a quick format is not advised on a new drive. I have two 750Gb drives that were quick formatted and have appeared fine.

 

[HavocXphere]

HDD manufacturers quote capacities as 1kbyte = 1000bytes (not 1024) so that calculation should be:

Seagate, Western Digital, Creative and a bunch of other companies got sued for that & settled/lost. All new-ish drives use the proper 1024 system.

 

[medicnick83]

I'd take the drive outta the casing, connect it via cables, format it and then put it back into the casing

That's what I'd do.

 

[sn3rd]

i am interested to know why a quick format is not advised on a new drive. I have two 750Gb drives that were quick formatted and have appeared fine.

Full format sets every bit to zero. This can be a problem on a new drive if some bits are indeterminate before using, because trying to read them can cause serious instabilities. Quick formats don't actually remove the data: it just tricks the hard drive into saying that there's no data by modifying whatever table is used to reference the data.

 

[nocilah]

Full format sets every bit to zero. This can be a problem on a new drive if some bits are indeterminate before using, because trying to read them can cause serious instabilities. Quick formats don't actually remove the data: it just tricks the hard drive into saying that there's no data by modifying whatever table is used to reference the data.

if i am not mistaken these drives were FAT32 before hand as in preformated and then i quick formatted to NTFS

 

[LazyLion]

Yes, took me ages to format my two 750 Gb drives. I always do a full format first time. The bigger these drives get, the longer it is going to take.

 

[Tux]

I'd take the drive outta the casing, connect it via cables, format it and then put it back into the casing

That's what I'd do.

That's what I always do. Saves you a lot of time

 

[HavocXphere]

@Halicon: I guess it helps to catch bad/unwritable spots on the HDD. Not that those are very likely on a new drive, but yeah, thats my theory anyway.

 

[antowan]

i am interested to know why a quick format is not advised on a new drive. I have two 750Gb drives that were quick formatted and have appeared fine.

Then they were preformatted and luckily in the file system you use.

 

[gregmcc]

gonna take a real long time to copy 1tb of data via USB!

 

[sn3rd]

if i am not mistaken these drives were FAT32 before hand as in preformated and then i quick formatted to NTFS

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=302686

There we go

 

[Tun@]

My other drives i've only ever done quick formats and also been fine.

When i was looking into this particular drive it seemed there was some having issues with them and this full format i believe checks for bad sectors which is why i'm doing it from the get-go to see i have any issues appear like i read some others did.
Seagate 7200.11 series ST31000340AS
I got an idea the problem ones were Thailand build....this one i bought from ComX (R2070) is OEM also but China build....
Running in Vantec Nexstar3 case, been running for 4 hours formatting & no horrible noises and temp is fine.
Price seemed right for 1Tb drive and Seagate I decided worth the risk.
Time will tell i guess.

The disk state was "RAW" so no not even preformatted
4 hours in .....47%

 

[Tun@]

Well i just Quick formatted now

Before i went to bed last nite i changed screensaver & power shutdown options to never.
Get up this morning and my notebooks locked up at 4am where that disc was 99% thru being completed
ctrl alt delete,.... no response....
No way am i going thru another 11 hours with possibly the same result.
Quick format and had to assign a drive letter and its working...
1Tb = 931GB usable