What is the formatting procedure for a user who is not on the “you” with the computer? Probably something very distant, foggy and incomprehensible. At the same time, a situation may arise when this procedure still has to be implemented. How to format a hard drive through BIOS and windows operating system ? We will find out about this now.
What formatting is
Whatever formatting tools you use, you must clearly understand what you are doing. Simply, when it comes to formatting a hard drive through a bios, you should distinguish between two of its features: high-level formatting (markup) and physical data deletion.
In the first case, the section is formatted. What is really going on? The file data table is erased, in which the addresses of all the data on the partition are written. And the content itself does not disappear anywhere. It is still located in its place. If necessary, using special software, the contents of the section can be restored.
There is also a repeated markup on the logical sectors, if we are talking about how to format a hard drive through BIOS or windows.
When it comes to the low-level “format C” procedure, here, in principle, the same thing happens, but the data is erased physically. A file data table (empty) is added to the beginning of the section, and each time new content is recorded, it is updated with information about the location of this content.
Re-allocation procedure. How to format a hard drive through BIOS
It should be noted that formatting through windows is more convenient and does not require knowledge of the BIOS. However, formatting the partition on which the system is present will thus fail. Therefore, we will consider how to run programs to re-partition the disk or physically delete data bypassing the operating system, namely through the BIOS.
Since our windows system is located on the hard drive and, as a rule, it starts after the computer boots up, this means the following: the bios finds the first one in the list of boot devices - the hard disk, and loads the operating system from the main system partition. With built-in OS tools, the format of the system partition is not feasible. That is why it is important to learn how to format a hard drive through a BIOS.
So, we need to run the boot shell from the CD (I do not consider the option “from a flash drive”, since it is not suitable for all PCs, and also boot from a floppy disk, because this method is very ancient and unproductive). Select one of the provided formatting programs in it. Then, through its interface, perform the negotiated procedure.
And one moment. The question of how to format the disk through the BIOS is incorrect. There are no built-in formatting utilities in the base I / O system. Using BIOS, you can only run the auxiliary software by booting from the devices supported by your PC.
Format partitions using windows
To perform this procedure with the standard utilities of this system, do the following:
- We sequentially run the Start components - Control Panel - Administrative Tools - Computer Management (for windows xp).
- We sequentially launch the Start components - Control Panel - System Security - Administration - Computer Management (for windows 7).
- As you can see, the difference between the versions is only in the names, and even that is small. Then in the window interface that appears, select "Disk Management" from the list of tasks.
- We right-click on the icon of the hard drive, which is to be formatted. In the drop-down menu we use the option “format”.
- Now we carefully look at the window where the section format parameters are selected. Enter the symbolic name for the selected section in the text area "volume label". You can also skip entering the name.
- We select a file system, by default it is ntfs. The cluster size is left as is.
For faster formatting, you can enable the “quick format” option to save time.