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Why would hard drive not format/

W

wd2b

Weaksauce
Joined
Sep 6, 2010
Messages
77
Hello Everyone,

Have a hard drive that's about two years old. Recently, I had to reinstal the OS, but in the middle of installation, had a power outage. Once regain power, tried reinstal again, would not do so.

Took out the hard drive and try to reformat it so it would be clean, but after almost three days, reformat completed, but only RAW, not NTSF as i planned.

Then tried a quick reformat, but got report that can't do so. Unchecked the quick format and tried again, but this time, it seems like would not do so. PC says it's formatting, but the progress bar shows no progress at all. Is this normal? It's been over a day now, and now progress shown. Why is this so?

Thanks in advance,
 
The hard drive probably became corrupted/defective during that power outage. Not exactly out of the question.
 
Danny Bui said:
The hard drive probably became corrupted/defective during that power outage. Not exactly out of the question.
Click to expand...

Thanks, Danny, for the input.

Any way I can get it to format again? Are there any other tricks to get try to get this thing formatted? Currently, I have the drive in an external enclosure, would it improve the chance if I put it in as an internal drive of another working system and then try to format it?

Oh I hope I get this drive back. Thank you in advance.
 
Look up on the web on how to delete the master boot record(MBR) and or a program to allow you to low level format the hard drive.

First try to delete the MBR and see if that fixes it.

Also check the drive for overlay software the allows older motherboards to use the full size of the drive, if that gets messed up it can be fixed sometimes by using the same software again.

Try the manufacturer's website of the drive for a progam(s) to do this.
 
Last edited:
thefreeaccount said:
you have to try it without the enclosure. Otherwise how do you know it's not the enclosure that is bad?
Click to expand...

A good thought! Though I have to say, the enclosure was working fine with another hard drive just prior to pulling it out to install this problematic one. To absolutely rule out any chance of the enclosure's contribution to the problem, you are right. Thanks.
 
CMD said:
Look up on the web on how to delete the master boot record(MBR) and or a program to allow you to low level format the hard drive.

First try to delete the MBR and see if that fixes it.

Also check the drive for overlay software the allows older motherboards to use the full size of the drive, if that gets messed up it can be fixed sometimes by using the same software again.

Try the manufacturer's website of the drive for a progam(s) to do this.
Click to expand...

Thank you! This is the stuffs that makes HardForum so famous for. Thanks!

Base on the instructions on how to erase the MBR here: http://www.ehow.com/how_5595687_delete-master-boot-record.html, I am assuming that this drive can be installed either as an external or secondary internal drive, correct? But I am a bit confused at step #5:

"5 In the upper left menu of Super Fdisk, select the drop-down menu that shows a list of your hard drives. If you have more than one hard drive listed, choose your primary hard drive, as this hard drive most likely contains the master boot record."

If I choose my primary hard drive, that would not be my unformatable drive, correct?

In the mean time, I will download and install the Supper Fdisk and await any clarification before proceed.

Thanks again.
 
You should be able to download a free utility right from the drive manufacturers web site to check the drive for problems. There should also be a utility to zero the drive, write 0's to the drive. Another option is to go into windows disk management and delete all the partitions on the drive. Then create a new one and format it. If that works you won't have to resort to any third party utilities to fix it.
 
alphanumeric said:
You should be able to download a free utility right from the drive manufacturers web site to check the drive for problems. There should also be a utility to zero the drive, write 0's to the drive. Another option is to go into windows disk management and delete all the partitions on the drive. Then create a new one and format it. If that works you won't have to resort to any third party utilities to fix it.
Click to expand...

Thanks will look into the manufacture's utility.

Currently, the drive doesn't show to have any partitions. Its status is "Raw" and healthy. Not sure if this makes any difference.

Would be real nice not to have to resort to third party utilities. Thanks again.

Edit: Will this get rid of the MBR?
 
Last edited:
Got SeaTools, installed and running it, but no where did I find an option for write to zero.

Same question stands: if I can find a way to write zero in this SeaTools, would it wipe out the MBR. Right now the drive shows up as RAW.
 
I'm not familiar with Seatools, my drives are all Western Digital. Amongst the tools though I would think there are options to check the drive for errors, and to prepare the drive for use. Tools to create partitions and format the drive, etc. The western Digital and Maxtor equivalents all have them. There may be more than one utility available though.
Have you tried to create (or delete) a partition on that drive from windows disk management? If you can create a partition in disk management, it shouldn't be a problem formating it then.
Whatever you do just make sure to do it to the correct drive. If you select the wrong one you could wipe out your current windows install.
 
Not to be a smart a$$, Did you try to re-partition the HD before trying to format. Had that happen before.
 
alphanumeric said:
I'm not familiar with Seatools, my drives are all Western Digital. Amongst the tools though I would think there are options to check the drive for errors, and to prepare the drive for use. Tools to create partitions and format the drive, etc. The western Digital and Maxtor equivalents all have them. There may be more than one utility available though.
Have you tried to create (or delete) a partition on that drive from windows disk management? If you can create a partition in disk management, it shouldn't be a problem formating it then.
Whatever you do just make sure to do it to the correct drive. If you select the wrong one you could wipe out your current windows install.
Click to expand...

Thanks, alphanumeric and nmanley,

Interestingly, there seems to be no option for creating a partition in Windows disk management. Unless, I missed something, in dis management, my drive shows up as "Raw" and "healthy (Active, Primary Partition)", but I don't want raw. When I right click on the drive, it did not give me a choice to create any partition.

Previously, I never did try to create any partition, just started formatting the whole drive.

If I missed a step that could allow me to create partition, please let me know.
 
In windows 7 right clicking on my external drive in disk management gives me a "Shrink Volume..." and a "Delete Volume..." option. I believe that is my delete partition option. See if you have a similar option and if you do try to delete the partition. If that works create a new one and then format it as NTFS.
 
alphanumeric said:
In windows 7 right clicking on my external drive in disk management gives me a "Shrink Volume..." and a "Delete Volume..." option. I believe that is my delete partition option. See if you have a similar option and if you do try to delete the partition. If that works create a new one and then format it as NTFS.[/QUOTE

Thanks for that info. Something must seriously be wrong with this drive. Whenever I tried to delete the partition, the PC would attemp it, but then the drive all of sudden disappear. Again, this drive is currently in a trusted external enclosure, but wonder if this disappearance what anything to do with the enclosure or merely the drive itself. Any thought?
Click to expand...
 
If I was a betting man I'd bet on the drive being defective. Seatools should confirm that if it is the drive gone bad.
 
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