The hard drive formatting procedure is pretty straightforward. In every operating system, there are tools to format hard drives.

How to Format a Hard Drive on Windows XP

We can go through My Computer then chose the necessary drive, right click on it, and then click format. You will be able to format external or internal hard disk or just disk D, F etc. Only one disadvantage with the Windows disk formatting program is that it does not show the hard disk surface visually. If you want to not only format the hard disk but also do some diagnostics, then you need to use a different software application. The Windows disk scanner shows scan results but only for a short time and it is not convenient to wait until it finishes.

How to Format HDD to FAT32

To format the HDD to FAT32, we simply need to go to the HDD formatting tool. Then just before formatting it, select the option for formatting it in FAT32. That’s it. Pretty simple, isn’t it?

In Windows XP, we go to My Computer -> Chose the disk -> (Right click on it) -> Choose the Format. In the File System dropdown menu, chose format to FAT 32.

How to Format External HDD to FAT32

External HDD in Windows is recognized normally as HDD, and Windows assigns a letter to it, such as F. To format the external HDD, you have to simply connect it to the computer, wait until Windows recognizes it and go to the tools described above. The external HDD will be seen next to computer’s internal HDDs.

How to Format Hard Drive in Vista

In Windows Vista, we go to My Computer-> Chose disk, for example E: -> (Right click) -> Format.

How to Format Hard Drive in Windows 7

Go to Start -> Computer -> Right click on the disk-> Format.

If you don’t have any operating system or don’t want to connect the infected hard drive to Windows, then the solution would be to use UBCD4WIN. UBCD4WIN is also capable to format an external hard drive connected to USB port. UBCD4WIN needs to be first compiled using the compiler from the developer’s site, and it needs a Windows XP installation disk. There is a guide how to compile UBCD4WIN on developer’s site. We will not go to the details here.

Hard disk formatting with UBCD4WIN is also a straightforward procedure. You need to take all the steps like mentioned above. Just first connect the external HDD to the computer. The external HDD will appear like the disk drive does.

Go to UBCD4WIN home page.