How to Format a Hard Drive with Windows 2000

If you're tearing your hair out trying to format your new hard drive, this guide will stop the premature balding by explaining the process.

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You Will Need

  • New hard drive
  • Basic computer knowledge
  • Patience

Steps

  1. Step 1

    Connect new drive

    Connect your new drive to your computer and follow the on the on-screen installation instructions.

  2. Step 2

    Click on Start button

    Click on the Start button and then right-click on My Computer and select Manage.

  3. Step 3

    Select Disk Management

    Select Disk Management under Storage from the navigation pane on the left side of the window.

  4. Step 4

    Right-click on drive

    Right-click on the the new drive and select Format from the pop-up menu. Choose either the NTFS or FAT 32 format for the new drive.

  5. While the FAT 32 format has a file size limit of 4 gigabytes, the NTFS format is only compatible with later versions of Windows.

  6. Step 5

    Label disk

    Give the drive a name, such as "new drive," and then click on Quick Format for new disk drives or Full Format for existing drives.

  7. A full format will take much longer than a quick format, but all the information will be completely erased.

  8. Step 6

    Wait and check

    Wait for the computer to finish formatting and then check the new drive by transferring a file and then accessing it.

  9. An Exabyte is 1 billion gigabytes. In 2006, the total volume of all internet traffic worldwide was 8.4 exabytes a year and growing.

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