Formatting hard drives is an easy process that anyone can learn, and should learn. After you have partitioned your new, or old, hard drive you need to format the hard drive.

The Formatting Process

There are two ways to begin formatting hard drives. If you just added a hard drive to your existing hard drive, then the formatting process is much simpler since Windows will do most of the work. To get up and running connect the hard drive and boot up your PC.

At the Windows desktop right-click the My Computer icon and select Manage. Click Disk Management in the left-hand tree, and every drive connected to your system will show up. Simply right-click your new drive and select New Partition. Then follow the steps to get your drive up and running.

If you have just built a new computer or just replaced your old drive, then there is another way you have to format your hard drive. You must do it in DOS, using your startup disk.

The only reason you have to do it this way is because if you are putting a new hard drive in (with no other existing hard drive) then there is no operating system, so you have only one option. Also, you might want to print out these directions since you obviously won't be able to see them again on your computer until your new hard drive is set up.

Create a Startup Boot Disk

You need to create your startup disk before you take out your old hard drive and replace it. If you are doing this to a newly built computer, then you need to find a computer with at least Windows 95 and create the startup disk on that computer.

The startup disk is just a standard floppy disc and only takes a few minutes to create.

To create the startup disk to begin formatting hard drives, follow the correct steps below for the corresponding operating system that you are using.

Windows 95/98/Me OS

1. Insert a blank floppy disk into the floppy disk drive.
2. Click Start, point to Settings, and click Control Panel.
3. Double-click Add/Remove Programs.
4. Then click the Startup disk tab, and after that, click Create Disk. Click OK when you are prompted.

Windows 2000 OS

1. Insert the Windows 2000 CD-ROM in the CD-ROM drive.
2. Click Start, and then click Run.
3. In the Open box, type drive:bootdiskmakeboot a:, where drive is the letter of your CD-ROM drive, and then press ENTER.

Windows XP OS

This will create an startup disk that allows you to boot to a DOS prompt. The disk does not contain any other tools or utilities.

1. Insert a blank floppy disk into the floppy disk drive.
2. Click Start, and then click My Computer.
3. Right-click the A drive icon, and then click Format.
4. Select "Create an MS-DOS startup disk," and then click Start.
5. Follow any prompts.

Start Formatting Hard Drive

Now you can start formatting your hard drive. WARNING: FORMATTING WILL ERASE ALL DATA

Your screen will show the size of your hard drive, and a countdown to when it will be complete.

Depending on your computer's speed and the size of your hard drive it can take from a few minutes to 30 minutes or more to finish formatting hard drive.