I finished formatting a 300GB HDD and wonder why it took so long.

[TazExprez]

I just finished formatting a 300GB SATA Maxtor DM10. I did a regular NTFS format and it took over an hour, maybe two. Is this normal, or is my drive messed up? Thanks for any help.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Well, if this is the first time that you've ever written to it, then the firmware automatically has a secondary "read verify" enabled for those sectors. It's a way of double-checking new drives for any defects. If you run HDTach 2.61's write-test (Warning: destructive!), then you can see the slow write-speed scores. If you interrupt it in the middle, and then start it over again, it will go at twice the speed through the sectors it has already gone through, and then slow down again once it hits the area of formerly-unwritten sectors.

Also, doing a regular NTFS format rather than a quick NTFS format, will do a read-verify surface-scanning pass over the disk volume as well, and for an entire 300GB, that will take a while.

 

[Alex]

its pretty normal i'd say... specially if its your first format... either way, the bigger the drive, the longer it takes to format afaik... next time use quick format option

 

[JimPhelpsMI]

Hi, Since Quick Format only "Erases" the drive and there is nothing to erase, I doubt if QF will do anything for you. Quick Format only marks all entries in all directories and leaves everything else as is. You probalby will be forced to use the standard Format on a new drive. Jim

 

[MrControversial]

I set up my system last night and I had a choice for quick format. It only took a few seconds. A full reformat on a 300GB drive will take a long time. Go eat dinner and take a shower or else you'll just be sitting and watching.

 

[madthumbs]

If I was in a rush to get up and running, I'd make a ~20gig partition for the OS, and leave the rest to be done in Windows. I could always go back and extend it later as well.

 

[techfuzz]

Be glad you're not scrubbing RAID partitions up to a TB in size. I've seen them take up to 8-10 hours.

techfuzz

 

[Icopoli]

make sure you partition it to 2 160gb or less, I think that's the max for WinXP, it didn't recognize more than that for my 300gb.

 

[aatf510]

Originally posted by: Icopoli
make sure you partition it to 2 160gb or less, I think that's the max for WinXP, it didn't recognize more than that for my 300gb.

There is an update for WinXP for that matter.

 

[corkyg]

Live and learn. If a farmer as 100 acres it takes him a given number of hours to do the job.

If he has 1000 acres, it might take him 10 times longer to do the job.

That's what happens when you use humongous hard drives. Everything has a price. Imagine how much longer it will take to optimize the 300 GB drive.