flameboy Posted April 4, 2009 Posted April 4, 2009 Ok so I have an old external hard drive that I want to format to FAT32 so I can use it to back up my PS3...how the hell do I format it to FAT32? I know XP only lets you do so if the drive is below a certain size...I tried a program called swiss knife or something and that crashes everytime I try to do it, any other ideas...
Wesley Posted April 4, 2009 Posted April 4, 2009 If you have an old Windows 98 with you, then just use the floppy at startup and format a drive that way. Make sure you don't format a drive you use though! Agh! If you don't have a 98 floppy, or don't even have a floppy drive, then do post saying so. (If you do have a floppy and a drive, but no 98, then I'm sure you can download the files online). Here is a link explaining how it can be done if you don't have a 98 disk! http://www.crapcontrol.com/content.php?article.14 And without having to download extra software.
flameboy Posted April 4, 2009 Author Posted April 4, 2009 no don't have a copy of 98 or a disk drive lol
Konfucius Posted April 4, 2009 Posted April 4, 2009 Try to format it using the command console. I actually never did that but I read you can set a lot more options that way. Just press Windows+R (or Start -> Run), type in "cmd" then type "help format" in the command window and you should get all the information on how to do it. I hope this helps :/
Wesley Posted April 4, 2009 Posted April 4, 2009 My bad, the link I gave does require some software download. But it is minor!
Shorty Posted April 4, 2009 Posted April 4, 2009 (edited) If windows disk management is being a pain, I reccomend GParted Live CD which you burn to CD and boot your PC from, brilliant partition platform. Edited April 4, 2009 by Shorty
flameboy Posted April 5, 2009 Author Posted April 5, 2009 (edited) Right really need help I'm in the command prompt and typed this; /FS:filesystem Specifies the type of the file system (FAT, FAT32, or NTFS). Your command line would be: format e: /FS:FAT32 which is what it tells me type..yet when I do it it says; The type of the file system is NTFSThe new file system is FAT32 Enter volume label for drive E: what the hell do I type?! tried googling and can't figure it out please someone help me! EDIT; sorted it out found out its just the name of the drive...its now formatting using cmd...will take hours likely so just leaving it running. Edited April 5, 2009 by flameboy
flameboy Posted April 6, 2009 Author Posted April 6, 2009 Why not download a disk management program and then do the job. Easy. Any suggestions? I don't wanna download a load of guff that doesn't work... I left it formatting when it was up to 55% when I came back to it was greeted with the message that the drive was too big for FAT32....sigh...
Shorty Posted April 6, 2009 Posted April 6, 2009 Try the one I posted, it's really easy to use, just boot from CD and follow the instructions
flameboy Posted April 6, 2009 Author Posted April 6, 2009 Try the one I posted, it's really easy to use, just boot from CD and follow the instructions On a netbook no CD!!!!
Shorty Posted April 6, 2009 Posted April 6, 2009 There's a USB version if you have a spare USB device?
flameboy Posted April 6, 2009 Author Posted April 6, 2009 There's a USB version if you have a spare USB device? errr....nope...will it run off an SD card? Couldn't get that program to work...sigh this is frustration... Finally done it...using a method found here; http://boardsus.playstation.com/playstation/board/message?board.id=ps3&thread.id=1325968&view=by_date_ascending&page=2 not the method by the thread starter but an alternative suggested by someone.
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