Re-formatting

[vickypark]

I once heard a friend say that ur hardware gets spoiled if u format it.....................is it true???

[utkarsh30june]

I once heard a friend say that ur hardware gets spoiled if u format it.....................is it true???

NO. It isn't true. As long as you have your Motherboard drivers in hand, Formating and re-installing Windows won't be a heck of a problem.
Your hardware won't get spoilt in any case by formatting the HDD.

[Raymond]

Yeah when I was very new to computers, I even heard that a hard disk can only be formatted an "X" amount of times. After that, your hard drive will start to fail.

Been formatting for many years and my hard drive is still working. Should ask MythBuster to check this one out.

[haddon]

lol Mythbuster... but yea, my hardware is still fine after formating it for years, so dont worry about it

[blackcobra]

I guess Low-Level formating would damage u'r HDD.

[kronos_fir18]

humm i've format lot's computer for lot's of times....still nothing is happenned/..
@blackcobra....low level???is there a level in formatting??...lol

[OUSAK]

Always do a quick format on your hard-drives.

A quick format just resets the file tables (or file system), thus making all your files disappear, which can be recovered if required (as long as you do not overwrite those sectors).


The "low-level" format also scans your disk, which takes forever, to identify any bad sectors, so it can then update the new file table, informing it what sectors to avoid.

So both the format and the quick-format scrap the old file table (the database which tells the OS where all your files are on the hard-disk, even if they are scattered in parts), and create a new file table.

When formatting for Windows XP + , use NTFS (which is the format of the file system). NTFS is more suitable for real large hard-disk capacities.

Bad sectors is not much of an issue these days, so don't bother. I'm sure the operating system can detect problems and resolve from bad sectors by writing data to a different sector.


Never sell your hard-drives... Always destroy them personally, unless you want some stranger recovering your files...

One way around this is to run special software that fills all the sectors on your hard-disk with random data, but this takes forever.

By the time you need to sell your old hardware, it's not worth anything, so it's better if you hang on to them... Gift them to your relatives etc.

[Polkadot]

Low level formatting your HD will NOT damage it, nor will formatting it. Yes, there is a low level format which is a basic function, usually done at the BIOS level. A HD which has been 'low-level' formatted will work on/under ANY OS. It basically just tells BIOS/OS what it is, where the sectors begin, and basic info any system needs in order to format it. I'm presuming, most HDs now come 'low' formatted since most OSes are now smart enough to figure it out.

The whole myth of killing a HD by over-formatting is just that...a myth. Yes you can kill a HD by formatting it, or reading/writing from it. It only has 'so many MILLIONS of times before failure' (MTBF). Unless you bought a bargain-basement, no-name HD, don't worry about it.

[Raymond.uk]

I have formatted my HDD about twelve times in the last five years with no problems at all. I use PC Beginner which I picked up on the internet three years ago and it is a very useful and comprehensive tool which does all the hard work, once you get used to its quirks. A tech guy I know bought one for himself when I showed him what it is capable of.