Hard Drive formatted but not empty

Pedroc1999 · 28 Dec 2012

Listen to greg and do not proceed if your not 100% sure that you have selected the right drive. I have recently done this on my external hdd with lots of photos that i might never see again

mibaup · 28 Dec 2012

gregrocker said:

Full format it from Elevated Command Prompt. Type:

DISKPART
LIST DISK
SELECT DISK # (insert HD # from LIST - DO NOT proceed if not positive)
CLEAN
CREATE PARTITION PRIMARY
FORMAT FS=NTFS LABEL="STORAGE"
EXIT
EXIT

will it be the same as the method LittleJay has offered? because if yes I did that already

pedroc1999 said:

Listen to greg and do not proceed if your not 100% sure that you have selected the right drive. I have recently done this on my external hdd with lots of photos that i might never see again

I hope I wont delete my Windows partition

AddRAM said:

Did you delete everything until the drive was completely unallocated space ?

AS MENTIONED.. use the partition wizard boot cd and get rid of everything.

Yes I did, it showed empty but only after formatting it , it shows those 90 MB that are in use.

DocBrown said:

You might want to try a Bootable version of Partition Wizard to delete the partition, then make a new partition, then format it.

Partition Wizard : Use the Bootable CD

I think I'll give up this Wizard and just leave those 90 MB, it seems too long

LittleJay · 28 Dec 2012

I think I'll give up this Wizard and just leave those 90 MB, it seems too long

Good choice. I hardly think you will ever miss those 90 Mb.

AddRAM · 28 Dec 2012

Post a shot of disk management.

mmkarimi · 28 Dec 2012

AddRAM said:

Post a shot of disk management.

so thats what you want.

for sure, go to the folder option, unckeck those shown bellow,
then go to the HDD, you will see two hidden folders which contain some system information.
recheck those again for security

AddRAM · 28 Dec 2012

No, that has nothing to do with disk management.

Also has nothing to do with other partitions.

gregrocker · 29 Dec 2012

I gave you the commands to both clean and full format the HDD which will check for recoverable sectors. You can also run a Disk Check to make sure nothing else is amiss. If you use Partition Wizard it can also do all of these things as well as run a Surface Scan to check the actual HD condition.

Because I had you run the commands from an Elevated Command Line and not DVD/Repair CD, it won't be possible to wipe your OS HD which will be running at the time and unavailable. But still make sure that you triple check you're choosing the correct HD no matter what method you use.

Please post back a screenshot of your maximized Disk Management drive map and listings:

1. Type Disk Management in Start

Search box.
2. Open Disk Mgmt. window and maximize it.
3. Type Snipping Tool in Start Search box.
4. Open Snipping Tool, choose Rectangular Snip, click New, draw a box around full drive map and all listings.
5, Save Snip, attach using paper clip in Reply Box.

Tell us what is on each partition.

mibaup · 31 Dec 2012

delete this post sry

mibaup · 31 Dec 2012

thanks for help everyone (Im staying with invisible 90 MB in use nvm

)