Best Format App out there?

[SlackerITGuy]

Looking to format my drive (completely) ASAP.

Thanks.

 

[zigzag3143]

Looking to format my drive (completely) ASAP.

Thanks.

You can use built in, acronis, parigon disk suite, and abt 50 more.

I prefer parigon, or acronis

 

[Tews]

+1 for acronis...

 

[SlackerITGuy]

What's the exact name of the Acronis app that would let me erase my entire drive?

 

[Tews]

Acronis Disc Director Suite ... get it -=> Here

 

[sup3rsprt]

Acronis Disk Director is no doubt the best, but I've been told that Windows 7 has issues with it. But since you guys are still recommending it I am beginning to wonder why I have been told that.

 

[Tews]

I really dont know.. Ive been using acronis products for a while now... True Image Home 2010 with no problems... /shrugs

 

[sup3rsprt]

What's the exact name of the Acronis app that would let me erase my entire drive?

By the way, erase and format are two different things. Luckily Acronis can do them both. However Acronis is not the most secure eraser out there.

I really dont know.. Ive been using acronis products for a while now... True Image Home 2010 with no problems... /shrugs

Good to know, thanks

 

[gforce23]

What's the exact name of the Acronis app that would let me erase my entire drive?

By the way, erase and format are two different things. Luckily Acronis can do them both. However Acronis is not the most secure eraser out there.

True, you need KillDisk for that.

 

[sup3rsprt]

but I would go for a free one. Something like DBAN or Eraser. There are many many free ones.

 

[SlackerITGuy]

What are the differences between 'erasing' and 'formatting'?

Any benefits?

 

[gforce23]

What are the differences between 'erasing' and 'formatting'?

Any benefits?

Erase only erases the filenames so that you can overwrite the data on the drive, unless you go in for an advanced eraser that rewrites all the data with zeros, ones or some algorithm. "Format" does the same thing, plus ensures that the HDD is setup to your requirements, something like NTFS, ext4 etc.

 

[SlackerITGuy]

So basically, when you format your drive... say via Windows Installation, the program/app writes zeros on the drive, then formats it to a standard FS? (NTFS, FAT, etc)?

 

[sup3rsprt]

Formatting a drive merely creates the file system. It doesn't purposefully erase anything. If anything gets erased it's merely the side effect of formatting the disk. The file system information could overwrite parts of a disk that, before the format, had once stored files.

That is the major reason why you can still recover data even after formatting a partition.

 

[SlackerITGuy]

So the recommended procedure would be: 'erasing' then 'formatting'?

 

[sup3rsprt]

Yes but erasing is really only necessary when you're trying to get rid of all traces of the previous data. Such as when selling a hard drive to someone else (you don't want any personal data to be recoverable by someone else)