How To Format Fat16 On Windows Vista
I really need to format a mem stick in fat16, is there some application out there that can do it for me? Im so embarassed to own 3 vista enabled pcs. What is the best way to format a USB drive with FAT32 (for Mac compatibility) from within Windows 7/Vista? I ask because the Disk Management only lets you pick.
Trying to format a large external USB or Firewire hard drive to the FAT32 file system? Only see an option for formatting the drive using the NTFS file format?
Well if you answered yes any of those questions, then you’re at the right place. I was recently trying to format my 1 TB MyBook external hard drive in Windows XP to FAT32 instead of the overly forced-upon NTFS format. Well because I needed to connect it to a NAS device and the NTFS permissions were causing the NAS not to be able to access the drive. Simple solution is to use FAT32, no security, no problems. Though it’s sometimes useful to. Also, formatting a drive in FAT or FAT32 will allow it to be read by other operating systems, such as Mac, Linux, and older versions of Windows such as Windows 98.
Unfortunately, Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 will only format a removable drive in FAT32 if it’s less than 32GB! Hmmmthat pretty much cuts out ALL modern external hard drives! However, Windows can format a drive that is larger than 32GB in FAT32, but you have to use the DOS command prompt. However, if you have a drive that is 1TB or larger, you may still get an error saying “ The volume is too big for FAT32”. In that case, you can use some 3rd party programs that will allow you to format an external hard drive with the larger size.
Let’s go through the different methods. In case you are having problems getting your external hard drive to show up in Windows, read my article on how to. Format in FAT32 using Drive-Specific Tools Before we get into using the command prompt and other third-party programs, it’s worth mentioning that some of the hard drive manufacturers have created their own tools for converting a drive which is larger than 32 GB to FAT32. Here is a list: Format External Hard Drive in FAT32 using DOS Open a command window by going to Start, then Run and typing in CMD. Now type in the following command at the prompt: format /FS:FAT32 X: Replace the letter X with the letter of your external hard drive in Windows.
Windows will go ahead and begin formatting the drive in FAT32! There seems to also be an issue when using the command line besides the size limit problem. Namely, it can take forever to format the hard drive for some users. Not sure why, but I’ve seen it enough times and it can be very frustrating to wait 5 hours and then have the whole format fail.
If the format is taking longer than an hour, just cancel it and try one of the methods below first. Format in FAT32 using Verbatim SmartDisk FAT32 Utility There is a free utility called which will allow you to convert your hard drive to FAT32 in seconds. I use to recommend a program called SwissKnife, which I mention below, but it’s no longer free and no one really needs to spend $10 to convert a hard drive from NTFS to FAT32.
There are lots of other free tools and this Verbatim one is one of the better ones. Just download it, unzip it and run the tool. It’s a standalone EXE file, so you don’t even have to install it on your system. Choose the drive you want to format, give it a Volume name and click Format Drive! It’s a painfully simple program to use and it works really well.
If you don’t even want to bother with the command prompt, just download this free tool and use it. Format in FAT32 using FAT32Format is another free tool you can use to get the job done. Choose the drive, the allocation unit size, give the volume a label, choose whether you want to do a quick format or not and then click Start. I would suggest not checking Quick Format so that way the entire drive is completely overwritten and you’re starting from scratch. I’ve tried this program and it was able to convert my 1TB hard drive to FAT32 without any issues. It did take longer than Verbatim, but I didn’t choose Quick Format, which probably would have been faster.
Format in FAT32 using FAT32Formatter Another option is the program from Tokiwa. Using this program, you can see the different partitions on the hard disk and format just one partition to FAT32 instead of the whole drive. It’s probably best not to have a mix of NTFS and FAT32 partitions on one drive, but you can do it if you want or if you need to for some reason. This program will allow you to do that. Format in FAT32 using SwissKnife is a nifty little program that used to be free, but not anymore, which you can use to format many types of external drives such as USB, Firewire, PCMIA, SATA and SCSI.
The link points to the CNET page, which still has the older free version you can download. You can also use it to create partitions on an external hard drive and it formats faster than Windows. With SwissKnife, you may run into an issue where after the conversion to FAT32, you are left with only a small percentage of the original disk size.
For example, if you format a 1TB drive, you might perform the conversion and end up with only 500 MB of space. This can be fixed by first reformatting the drive in NTFS format by performing a quick format. Once you format the entire drive using NTFS, make sure to view the available space in Explorer and that it matches the size of the hard drive. Once you do that, go ahead and use SwissKnife to perform the conversion to FAT32. So next time you want to format a hard drive in FAT32 and Windows only gives you an option for NTFS, make sure to follow one of the methods mentioned above. Found this link in another forum, posted by a guy asking the same question.
It's to the Western Digital knowledge base entry 'How do I format an external USB or FireWire hard drive as FAT32 in Windows?' WD offers a small utility that can convert the drive to a single FAT32 partition. Quote: Western Digital has a Windows based utility that will reformat a Western Digital external USB or FireWire hard drive back to the factory default FAT32 partition.
When run, this utility can only create a single FAT32 partition for the full capacity of the hard drive. LOOK HERE!!!! I'll save everyone a lot of time!
Go to download the formatter (its a really small file anyways) Plug in your hardrive. (take off any files on your hardrive and save them to something else (computer or other hardrive, or whatever) since all data will be lost).
Load the formatter program. Select your physical drive. Click the middle big rectangle box, then hit delete partition. Hit the big box again, then start. (It takes a looooonnnnngg time for it to reformat (overnigth for me), but I plugged it in to my XBOX 360 afterwards with an.AVI file, and it worked like a charm! Havn't tried it with MP4 file yet, but I'm sure it'll work. If not download a free converter on download.com and convert your files.) ENJOY!!!
Will is right!!!!!!!!! Finally, I f-ing solution! G-damnit I was getting frustrated! Like other people, that idiotic SwissKnife was only seeing my brand new Seagate 1TB drive as 500GB. Yet idiotic Windows XP was seeing the full 1TB. Usually, non-Micropoop programs beat the snot out of MS programs. Not in this case.
What an absurd problem with SwissKnife. It's like SwissKnife is a program that performs a whole metric ass-ton of functions. ALL it does is format, and it cant even do the most basic one correctly? (especially since 1TB drives are so incredibly common, and this is exactly what a lot of people want to do them). And yes, before you start ragging.of course I updated and tried this on the lastest version. So after lots of trial-n-error involving numerous configurations of external HD cases, ect.I FINALLY found this place, used FAT32formatter, and now I am up and running with a FAT32 formatted HD.
So simple even a Microsoft employee could do it. One thing though, if you choose the normal format instead of the 'fast', then it will take all night. So do it before bed, and within 10 (ish) hours, you are done. Why was this cool and easy program so damn difficult to find? I tried Google searched, nonags, and all the usual spots, and I found this place by complete accident. 🙂 Dont you just love happy endings? (knock on wood).
Solution for those who are having trouble with 'get 429 GB out of a 1TB External HDD' using: Two System of Steps: First Steps: Format it to NTFS using WINDOWS – the control panel– Administrative Tools – Computer Management – Disk Management – Format all of it to NTFS (I used Quick format) Second Steps: Re-Format it to FAT32 using SWISSKNIFE, swissknife will recognize the whole 1TB now – right click on the NTFS partition – format – Format all to FAT32 (also used Quick format) First it will not display FAT32 conversion. Unplug the external HD safely, replug it back in pc/latop so it'll recognize it as FAT32.
I found this out after hours.of finding how Not to do it. Just want to share how I did, to save some people time. Ok the FAT32 format in DOS didn't complete. I woke up to the blue screen of death (atapi.sys) and another one of 0x0000007f. Not to worry- happens all the time in my house! I later tried to format with bootable 'Super F Disk', and it has worked properly!
Unfortunately, my xbox360 still doesn't see it! 🙁 (It's a promedion 'powered by hitachi' 160GB USB/Firewire hard drive from about 6 years ago) I keep getting strange messages though when copying mp3 files to the hd, that if i continue, i will lose data such as 'Macintosh application info' and 'Macintosh multimedia resources'. This makes me think i should maybe change it back to NTFS though first i will drag the old mac from out of the cupboard to see it it reads/writes to it. Hi All, This REALLY works. I have 1.5 tb iomega prestige usb 2.0 hard drive. I wanted to format it to fat 32.
I have tried everything from dos utility to swissnife and all others. They were running for 6-8 hours and were not working. I was stupid. Then I realized that iomega should have something. I went to their site and downloaded fat32 format. It formatted my 1.5 tb in 10 seconds. I mean 10 seconds.
So my suggestion is go to your hard drive manufacture's site and download it or ask for their help. I hope this helps.
Thanks, Kalpesh. I found another way – System Rescue CD can do it. SRD is a version of Linux bootable from a CD that includes tools to manipulate hard drives. It can backup hard drives, just about any format except one, NTFS, which is in beta. It can also resize partitions. VERY useful if you bought a computer with an OS installed and you want to create another partition for backups (for instance, when using Norton Ghost). To get SRD to work takes a bunch of steps though, you have to download the CD image file (.iso) burn it (I have a hard time finding it every time in Nero), then boot it.
Assuming you get to the command prompt, you type wizard and return. Then either type gparted at the command window that pops up, or select it from the menu. At this point it my memory gets a little fuzzy, but I think you (right?) click on the partition and select FAT32. Now the part that took me the longest time. You have to click on APPLY. With gparted, you tell it everything you want to have happen, and the order you want it to happen, and then it does them all when you select APPLY.
Nothing will happen if you don't click on APPLY. The Xwindows/Linux can be daunting for anyone who has never used it. Also note that to backup up a hard drive you need to 'mount' it first. Right before you type wizard there is a comment about it. Search the web, or ask a Linux-knowing friend, or read and re-read the SystemRescueCD website. Hope this helps Michael. Quote: 'Unfortunately, Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 will only format a removable drive in FAT32 if it’s less than 32GB!
Hmmmthat pretty much cuts out ALL modern external hard drives!' (-) actually that pretty much cuts out almost 'All' modern disks internal or external good luck purchasing anything less than a 40GB; except the new SSDs are available in less than 32GB I absolutely don't care for NTFS one bit, I find the security permissions / denials a useless pain in the rectal area which is where M$ should insert NTFS, along with their 'File Ownership' junk; I go out of my way to avoid using NTFS, and use FAT / FAT32 as much as possible; Programming the 32GB FAT32 limit was just plain rude! Just like the programmed 128GB RAM limitation of 64-Bit windows, when they know full well that 64-bit address space is way larger than that I use a Symantec Enterprise Product (BESR 6.52) to create all my FAT32 disk partitions (use windows to create a 20GB FAT32 primary partition and use copy drive in BESR with the options to expand volume to fill empty space) though technically I may be in violation of the EULA in 'working around, any limitations in windows' but as far as I'm concerned, I need large FAT32 external disks and it's none of their business how I created them. And if I decide to install one or more of those large FAT32 disks internally oh well. As Ben Wintle said above.
I tried all of the suggestions offered, which worked to some degree, but the Verbatim option worked quickly, flawlessly and painlessly. I formatted my 1TB external LaCie HD with a Samsung drive using the Verbatim software in about a minute and it formatted the ENTIRE HD leaving me 966GB of usable FAT32 formatted space. I wanted my HD formatted to FAT32 to use via the USB cable to attach it to my Pioneer DVD player in order to view.avi files because the only format my player will recognize is FAT32. Forget the other suggestions.I'm sure some have success with one or the other.but the Verbatim option takes 2 minutes of your time, works as it should and cuts the frustration level down to zero. Hello, If anyone like me had trouble useing the SwissKnife program on a 1 TB or more HDD, and not being able to format in DOS I found a solution that worked for me.
First, I used my Windows XP CD, to split my HDD into two Disks, 'D' and 'E'. 'D' I made 32 GB and 'E' I made the rest, 960 GB. Then I used DOS to format Disk 'D' (32 GB) in flesystem FAT32.
My Disk 'E' (960 GB) I formated in NTFS, where I can store all my things. When I want to watch a movie useing the xbox, I put the movies, music or what ever, in the Disk 'D' where FAT32 was installed and it works perfectly. Use Disk 'E' to store all the movies, music you got!
Thank you, Will, for sharing that very important program. I went through the process of clearing a backup drive (took all night) before trying the format tool. (Only to see it lacked FAT32 and instead had something else FAT. (Which did not work.) Went to Download.com. Found SwissKnife. (Which acted like it was doing something. But, in fact, did nothing at all.
How To Reformat Windows Vista
Then, crashed after several attempts to reload it.) Followed it up with finding this help site and tried the DOS approach. Got some sort of message about not having the authority to run such a process. Never heard of 'elevated mode', before.). The Fat32Formatter found at works for converting a 250gb WD My passport Essential portable HD. It is simple. It is straightforward. Plus plenty of people have made comments on how to use it if you can't get it working.
My ps3 has recognized it and I have been able to back up my data without a problem. I also used a WD Scorpio Blue 250gb 2.5in SATA HD running at 5400rpm for the internal upgrade for my ps3.I did not use the quick format and used the regular formatting for my external in Fat32Formatter. For ps3 users: Make sure you buy an external HD that you can then use with your bigger brand new internal HD. When you use the back up function it will take at least an hour (mine took 1hr 7min for backing up 40gb) to back up & reinstall. I bought 2 250gb drives. When you start up your ps3 it will prompt you to format your new HD.
You will notice almost immediately that your user information is saved to RAM except for trophies. These are saved via the Sony server and all it takes to retrieve them is a simple Sync. All is well 🙂. I was trying to format my 500GB western digital external so I could do a backup for my PS3 (in the progress of swapping my tiny 60GB HDD with my laptops almost-never-used 160GB), but most of the methods above didn't work.
Using cmd method took 6-8hrs just to tell me the external was too big for FAT32. Swissknive and fat32formatter didn't work.
For some reason Fat32Formatter opened and closed immediately. I tried on both, Windows XP and Windows 7. So I gave up with the 500GB external and tried with a 120GB Seagate external, but same story. In the end, the program that got the job done without any complains and took less than 5mins was: Partition Wizard Home Edition (FREE 32 & 64 bit, Win7 Compatible) Doing a PS3 backup at this moment. Post 18 by Paul God Bless you I must be the 20ish to thank him but I just need to do the same. Fat32Formatter is definitely the software you are looking for. You'll find that it's slow but the result is perfect.
The software looks like it's from another decade but the results are there. Remember to empty your Hard Drive before using Fat32Formatter though. You could always look for a manufacturer's software but Fat32Formatter is the universal solution for Mac/PC/Linux users who want their insert name & size here Hard Drive to be in Fat32 format. Again, thanks Paul and everyone who tried and gave their comments about the Fat32Formatter. 1st off I just wanna reach out & give you a great BIG HUG!
All my aggravation has been lifted and it was quite a trying experience on my patienceDefinitely post #18 FTW, for my 500GB Toshiba laptop HD that i bought a USB (Ācomdata for 2.5' SATA HDD)case for to use with PS3. It happens to be a very nice small sleek streamline BLK case that resembles that of a small 6oz. Plus its thinner than an iPhone & only about a 1/2' wider & longer. Case in point is that its much smaller than those premade Ext. HD's out there. When all is said & done the price comes out to be about the same if not less than some of those premades.
I have been reading this thread for a couple of days now going insane trying out all the different software solutions. I have tried numerous software, via links provided in this thread. The only one to work with out any difficulties is post #18 However there is still 7.37 GB of used space on it after formating, but i dont care because thats expected & it worksMy hats off to you, 'CHEERS'!!! On that note I will be celebrating by toasting a nice big warm glass of Remy X.O.
In your honor Thanks again! Mkss55442 I used so may programs that I can't even remember, any program that they mention here, I tried them all. But I did find a program from other website the application file is name as guiforformat, and it works perfectly just in 5s and I got it formatted to FAT32. Yeah and I'm really surprise too how did he got it works in DOS for 1TB, I tried that in my vista and XP computers, non of them works.
But now I have another problem, that is none of the program can read my hard drive, I have a Clickfree 320GB, its a gift from a friend. Now that i can format to FAT32, I wanna do partition to split it into 2 storage, one is NTFS to store files, and the other is FAT32 to store all the movies and pictures, but non of the program can read my hard drive I tried the disk management but don't let me do partition, all the 'extend volume, shrink volume, delete volume' are gray, can't select Appreciate if anyone here can help, if not I guess I just have to live with itlol. Thank you all for the suggestions. Many people dont know this but u can format an external drive of up to 2TB if u have windows xp. Go to start menu and click up 'Run' 2. Type in 'cmd' in the run box and click 'Ok' 3.
A black box will appear 4. In the black box you have to type in a command issueing the computer to format your external hard drive. It has been a while since I have done this so I cant remember the exact command but you can google it. It was something like 'format fat32/ drive O' Thats not exactly it but it is very close to that and 'O' would be the letter of my external hard drive so it would be a different letter for you depending on what usb slot you have your external hard drive plugged into.
It took about 3-4 hours for my 1TB to be formatted but I didnt lose any storage space at all. On the other hand if you use SwissKnife you can lose up to 60% of your storage space. Trust me I know. Hey guys, I had the same problem as all of you, after doing the command prompt said file size was too big for format!
And then I tried swissknife and the program crashed. BUT, I found a solution that ACTUALLY does WORK!
Go to this site: Herbdoctor also recommended this side in the older comments. Just download the fat32format.exe file, paste it simply in drive C: or D: (don't paste it into any complicated folders in those drives, just paste it into the drives themselves)then follow the steps given on that site and BAM, it'll format in 3 seconds in a new FAT32 system. Good Luck Guys.
Just like many folks here who used swissknife to format to fat32 their 1tb external usb hdd, i also got out of my 1tb hitachi simple drive external hdd only 429gb, to my consternation. Thank you to the fat32formatter (and the people behind it) and to those who shared the links and their experiences with it in this forum, i was able to get 931.51gb out of my 1tb, not bad at all. I intend to connect via usb this hitachi hdd to my ps3 as the latter has only 40gb in it.
By the way, i used the 'quick format' option in the program and was done in less than 90 seconds. Ok guyz, Im so happy i cant even type anything. Yesterday I came back from work, and used the fat32formatter, it took exactly 12hourz but its all done very very neatly, I formatted NTFS to FAT32, now I have 1TB of FAT32, and i connected it to my PS3 and itz working just WOW, I tranferred all my movies, songs, concerts, pictures etcAll is fine, please dont beat yourself using crap like DOS or wateva, just use the FAT32formatter and your done. Thank You all for ideas and advises and help, Iam very grateful to all of you who helped and need help. I just had the hardest time trying to format my external hard drive.
This will also work with Win Vista StartAccessories then Right-click on Command Prompt then choose: 'Run as Administrator'. After that enter: 'format /FS:FAT32 X:' X is for the drive you want to format. Now this is where it got tricky I was asked for the VOLUME LABEL of the drive. I still don't know what the hell I did but some how I got it right.
If I had to do it over, I am sure I couldn't do it. If you want to use this Instructions for Windows Vista make sure you know what your 'volume label' is. Otherwise, you are going to spend a long time trying to format your external hard drive. The things we must go through as gamers to improve our PS3s. Thanks for this informative article. I have a western digital 320GB hard drive.
I had formatted that using western digital tools but the tool does not do more than 137GB for Windows XP. I have read all the comments here and tried all the 4-5 different utilities which were suggested by different people here but nothing worked. Finally I tried WD Fat32 Formatter.
This tool has an option to restore Western Digital hard drive to factory default using Fat32 format type. It works half way and at the end gives an error 'Read image error'. I will appreciate if you guys have any other option. Before I used #18, my drive was F:, I only can see my HDD info from Disk Management, File System RAW, after I used 18#, I can see HDD from both my computer and Disk Management,File system is FAT32, drive change to E: I was so happy, finally I got done after so many methods used. But today I tried to plug in HDD again, I couldn't see from both Disk Management and MY computer, even when I want to run Fat32Formatter to reformat, I could not access from physical drive, it disappeared. What I should do now??????
Tried using the DOS option to format a 500GB Western Digital Elements Portable. Waited for a few hours only to have the thing tell me that it is too big for FAT32. So I tried the Tokiwa link in post #18, took awhile, but worked like a charm and I only lost about 640kb of disk space. WD has some programs at the support site for converting to FAT32, but those were a pain just to install.
Ended up not using it at all. So now I've got a 500GB External HD hooked up to my Wii and the games are loading great! It is February 8, 2010. This is a testimonial that the fat32formatter discussed in post #18 (and commented on in post 37, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 66, etc) works as discussed. I have a 1TB Hitachi simpledrive which was formatted in NTFS and an Oppo dvd-player that only supported USB drives formatted with the FAT or FAT32 file system; therefore, I needed to reformat my Hitachi hard-drive into FAT32, and fat32formatter worked superb. Tip: Check the quick format box- it took me less than two minutes to format my 1TB(931 GB) hard drive, and it works great with my Oppo dvd-player (and my Xbox as well as with my PS3).
Without checking 'quick format' it will take anywhere from 5-10 hours with minimal benefit. In my opinion, not worth the time, trust me, check the quick format box, you will be happy. It is noteworthy to state that the normal format mode does check your hard drive for bad sectors; however, you can do a quick format and then check your hard drive manual using the chkdsk command (just go to start menu and type chkdsk), and save yourself hours. Hi, download fat32format.
Copy exe file to directory and start cmd and change to that directory. Then cmdfat32format f (drive letter): and then enter. 4sec and everything converted. C:fat32format f: Warning ALL data on drive 'f' will be lost irretrievably, are you sure (y/n):y Size: 1000GB sectors 512 Bytes Per Sector, Cluster size 32768 bytes Volume ID is 7e4:23a 32 Reserved Sectors, 238409 Sectors per FAT, 2 fats 30516293 Total clusters 30516292 Free Clusters Formatting drive f: Clearing out 476914 sectors for Reserved sectors, fats and root cluster Wrote 244179968 bytes in 9.72 seconds, 23.96 Megabytes/sec Initialising reserved sectors and FATs Done C:chkdsk f: The type of the file system is FAT32. Volume Serial Number is 07E4-023A Windows is verifying files and folders File and folder verification is complete. Windows has checked the file system and found no problems.
976,521,376 KB total disk space. 976,521,344 KB are available. 32,768 bytes in each allocation unit.
30,516,293 total allocation units on disk. 30,516,292 allocation units available on disk. As this article is still coming up high on a websearch, I'd like to add another possible way to format an external hard drive as FAT32. It uses a little program called 'h2format.exe' you can download from the site of a renowned german computer magazine (c't). (If this link changes in the future, just search for h2format.) First, go to control panel, administrative tools, computer management, then disk management. Right click on the harddrive you would like to format and delete any partition already present (you've backed up your data already, haven't you?).
Then right click on the the same drive again and create a primary partition, assign a drive letter (e.g. F:) but choose the option 'Don't format the partition'. Your hard drive does now have a drive letter but no file system. Open the zip file you've downloaded and copy 'h2format.exe' into C: Now open a command prompt (Start – Run – type: cmd – Enter). Type: C: Type: h2format F: (Replace F: by the drive letter you've assigned previously.) That's it, it should work perfectly well. This works PERFECTLY on WD250gb Drive-Done within 15seconds Found this link in another forum, posted by a guy asking the same question.
It’s to the Western Digital knowledge base entry “How do I format an external USB or FireWire hard drive as FAT32 in Windows?” WD offers a small utility that can convert the drive to a single FAT32 partition. Quote: Western Digital has a Windows based utility that will reformat a Western Digital external USB or FireWire hard drive back to the factory default FAT32 partition. When run, this utility can only create a single FAT32 partition for the full capacity of the hard drive. Lost disk space after using SwissKnife to convert NTFS to FAT32? From the research that i've done, it seems that 'SwissKnife' will format approximately upto 500GB (why this happens I do not know?). If you have tried to convert NTFS to FAT32 on anything above that, you may find you are left with less disk space than you started with.
To get back the lost space, here is one possible solution: N.B. EXTERNAL DRIVES ONLY!! (as it formats the whole drive and you will lose everything/all data) Using XP Start My Computer (right click) External Drive Format OK OK Once XP has finished formatting your external hard drive to NTFS (this may take a while) you will need to do the following: Start Run type 'cmd'(this opens a black window called command prompt) from command prompt type 'diskpart.exe' (minus quote marks) then type 'select volume x'(x being the external hard disk) then type 'extend' Exit command prompt and you should have all the space back on your external hard drive. I would use the 'fat32format' method to convert from here on in.
Hope this helps. Just thought i'd share as I've been frustrated with this problem all day – what a way to spend a pleasant Sunday afternoon! 🙂 Some helpful links:. I bought an external hard drive from smalldrives.com last week. It came in NTFS but I needed it to work with my PS3 which only accepts FAT32 contacted Smalldrives and they were very helpful with sending some instruction and a piece of software that only runs on winxp but that does the job very easily. Its called Maxblast and it is made by maxtor.
Easily formats usb external hard drives in fat32 or any other format. You will need version 4 of maxblast as the latest version is a bit peculiar and is not as user friendly.
Hey I figured it out go into the command line by clicking the start button the run tab will pop up in the box type cmd then click enter. DOS screen screen should pop up. And it will say C:Documents and Settings then type this after the format /fs:fat32 x:(the x is the drive you wanna create to fat32) Then it will state The type of file system is NTFS The new file system is FAT32 Enter current volume label for drive X: (RIGHT HERE YOU HAVE TO TYPE THE NAME OF YOUR DRIVE YOU CAN LOCATE THE NAME BY GOING TO MY COMPUTER AND WHATEVER NAME YOUR DRIVE IS THAT IS THE VOLUME LABEL) Ater you type that is will state Drive x: will be lost Proceed? Type yes and there you go it will format your whole drive to FAT32. But it is very slow but you will format the whole drive.
FWIW, I've had this exact problem multiple times with needing an external hard-drive formatted in FAT32 instead of the out-of-the-box NTFS After multiple failed formats/reformats, partitioning, etc., I take the disk, plug it into my wife's Mac Powerbook and it says, 'Cannot Read Disk, Please Format' (or similar) and then I can select different NTFS formats and also FAT32 Takes about 30 seconds and it's done How weird is that?? And my disks always work after that, and I can see all of the disk space (just did this yesterday with a 500GB WD ext USB drive) You might have to 'wreck' the formatting by having a failed attempt on a Windows box prior to putting it into a Mac (which I always do) to ensure it prompts you for the format Hope these ramblings are at least fairly clear 😛. I feel your pain, so I'm posting a solution I used.
It allowed me to format a FAT32 1TB external hdd in only a few seconds! This is where I found a super awesome script (also available in a gui app) for FREE: ridgecrop.demon.co.uk (FAT 32 Formatter link on the left) I've been using my 1TB HDD with the PS3 for a couple years now and have been very satisfied with the results. (Except you can expect a performance hit as you begin to load it with content.) Make sure to follow the PS3 directory naming rules. This link might help: ps3explained.com/advanced/folder-structure/ Basically, after you format the HDD, create 3 folders with UPPERCASE names: MUSIC, PICTURE, VIDEO.
Then, the PS3 will find your content. If you try naming your PICTURE directory 'PHOTOS', for example, the PS3 will not read the contents. I found an easy to use program on Seagate's website. The have a program called Disc Wizard. Simply install it and when you plug your external drive into a USB port, start up the program. It will show you the external drive and your PC's hard drive in a list. Just highlight the external drive letter and select to erase the files off the external drive.
Fat16 Fat32
Then, it will ask you what format you want to put on the drive. Simply put a check mark in the box for FAT32 and proceed with the next step. Not even a minute later it will be done. I did this to a Seagate 320 gig GoFlex Free Agent external hard drive.
It's real easy to do. I had no trouble figuring out the steps and I have never done this procedure before. I have just bought a WD Elements 2TB HDD and have wasted the day trying to reformat to fat32 for use on my PS3. However it now works thanks to fat32 formatter found at Points to note: – Unfortunately at the time of writing this the WD elements fat32 formatter found on their website was not compatiable with the 2tb model, however even if it was I hear that you may not be able to partition the whole capacity of the drive, therefore I'd highly recommend Fat32 Formatter!! – once the fat32 formatter is open, delete any partition already in place and click update. – you can format it so all the available capacity is used (in my case 1.81tb) – ensure you click quick format (I don't know the difference between that and the normal way but it still worked and took only 15 seconds. If you don't click quick format you'll literally be there all night and I don't even know if it will work.) – once it is complete unplug the drive and plug it back in – after that it should read it as fat32.
– I then plugged it into my ps3 and it read it after a short delay. @Jenna you got duped, that program was available for free when this was written.
However due to this article the author got so many hits on his website he decided to charge for it. Why buy a program that is problematic at best?
Did you not read a single post here? There are many many free tools out there that are FREE and do the same thing, just search. Don't be lazy.
The HP one works fine, however you may get some size errors displaying. Free space being taken up etc.
The others listed by in other posts probably work just as well. 'PROBLEMATIC AT BEST'. If you really want to do this properly, stick your drive on a LINUX machine and format via console. Problem solved. Linux never fails.
As per the norm (since software engineers fail to appreciate the value in making their software work), the SwissKnife installer will not install under Vista. It will not install as the current user, it will not install as Administrator. It starts the install process and then just gives up. Well, it's only gone from the UI because it lingers on in the Task Manager while it goes and does absolutely nothing. I'm so sick and tired of these clever programmers and their inability to make their software work. Ok for those who have probs with losing their terabyte down to 400 mb, the guy who posted comment #43 got it right, i used the windows disk management to put it back to ntfs and then opened it in swiss knife again, where you can see the disk sayingg over 900mb right click and then choose format.
I did it KH∀ said on: February 11th, 2009 at 1:57 am Solution for those who are having trouble with “get 429 GB out of a 1TB External HDD” using: Two System of Steps: First Steps: Format it to NTFS using WINDOWS – the control panel– Administrative Tools – Computer Management – Disk Management – Format all of it to NTFS (I used Quick format) Second Steps: Re-Format it to FAT32 using SWISSKNIFE, swissknife will recognize the whole 1TB now – right click on the NTFS partition – format – Format all to FAT32 (also used Quick format) First it will not display FAT32 conversion. Unplug the external HD safely, replug it back in pc/latop so it’ll recognize it as FAT32.
I found this out after hours.of finding how Not to do it. Just want to share how I did, to save some people time. Verbatim – nailed it – in seconds.
Thank you Peter peter said on: August 29th, 2011 at 12:57 pm People please listen to me, Verbatim FAT32 format utility works flawlessly. I formatted my external drive with this tool, and it did it all in under 10 secs.After waiting four hours for the DOS method to fail The drive is used to record tv on my freesat hd box. All data on the drive will be deleted, so be sure to make backups of your important files. Works on Vista and Windows 7.
This is the link to the dowwnload. The steps we have to execute are elaborated below: # STEP 1: Go to “start→run→cmd” # STEP 2: “cmd” window will be appeared now.
# STEP 3: Press “cd.” & then “ENTER” button. Then press these again. #STEP 4: Now you’ve entered into drive c://. # STEP 5: Now go to pen drive. Let your pen drive is in “i://” drive.
Then press “i:”. “Then ENTER” # STEP 6: Now write “format i:”. Then press “ENTER”. # STEP 7: A confirmation message will appear now for being sure. Press “Y” for yes & then “ENTER”.
# STEP 8: Now press any name you want to give the pen drive & then “ENTER”. # STEP 9: Write “exit” & press “ENTER” to complete your operation. # STEP 10: Now use your pen drive safely. Hi all, don’t know if this is still in use or relevant but needed to reformat a couple of Seagate portable (USB) Hard Drives (320 Gb & 500 Gb) for DVR use with a digital TV tuner (set top box) – some boxes limit size of hard drives depending on format so couldn’t go larger & had to use FAT32.
I use win XP pro so dos format was out. Read this list & decided to try the Ridgecrop utility which claims reformat speed of 4 secs per terabyte & now offers a GUI version – too easy to believe.
Fat16 Format Utility Download
Downloaded the GUIformat utility from. to C: root directory – plugged in portable drive (NTFS formatted by default) – clicked on ” Guiformat ” in C: – 2 seconds, job done – with slight hiccup that error message showed ‘volume label too long’. Default label was too long, cut it to 11 characters, instant success- Enjoy! My external hard drive has a problem. It shows on my computer as local disk F and i have tried accessing it to format it through the command prompt and through computer management and all it doees is that it slows down the whole system and i have even waited for a few hours, nothing shows up on the cmd or the computer management tab. Once i unplug, everything becomes fast as usual and the other drives on the computer show up nicely.
Since it slows down the system, I cannot get to format it through any means i know of. Can you please help me i just need to format it, i don’t care anymore about the files on it, i just need to have it working again.