# [SOLVED] How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?



## Matt D. NickL (Sep 22, 2013)

Be gentle with me, this is hard to type on phone's key pad. Haha.

Sorry if I'm in wrong section.

It has it's own power supply.

Communicates with laptop via USB port.

Capacity: 931 GB
File system: NTFS (Default)
Allocation unit size: 4096 bytes

Regular format? _Not_ "Quick Format". That' makes sense right?

I google and am now under the impression this a long project, though I'd still have done it anyways. In your experience, how long can this take?


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## JMPC (Jan 15, 2011)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

A full format of a 1TB drive will take at least an hour or two. It's been a long time since I've done a full format but it's not a quick process.


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## Matt D. NickL (Sep 22, 2013)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

Thank you J.


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## sobeit (Nov 11, 2007)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

a quick format will only take a minute or so.


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## Masterchiefxx17 (Feb 27, 2010)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

I don't like Quick formats. Stick with a standard format which will take some time.


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## Matt D. NickL (Sep 22, 2013)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*



Masterchiefxx17 said:


> I don't like Quick formats. Stick with a standard format which will take some time.


Ok. I do that always, it just seemed cleaner (in my head) and more through. There's no progress bar for this, it _is_ working right?


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## Masterchiefxx17 (Feb 27, 2010)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

There should be a percentage if you did it in Disc management.


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## Matt D. NickL (Sep 22, 2013)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*



Masterchiefxx17 said:


> There should be a percentage if you did it in Disc management.


 
http://img22.imageshack.us/img22/6315/k6v9.jpg

I went to Computer, the right clicked Local Disk (E), which is the external hard drive and selected the format option from there. Then that little window on the right popped up and it's been there for about 2 or 3 hrs now.


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## Masterchiefxx17 (Feb 27, 2010)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

Cancel the process and open Disc Management. From there try to format the drive again.


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## Matt D. NickL (Sep 22, 2013)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

Will do, ty


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## spunk.funk (May 13, 2010)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

A* Quick* Format just removes files from the volume. 
A normal or Full Format removes files but also checks the HDD for bad sectors. Where it will mark it as a bad sector and not store data on that sector. If the HDD is relatively new, a Quick Format should cover it. But if the drive is aged, then a Full Format is recommended. A newish drive should do a Full format in an hour or 2. But if there are bad sectors it may take much longer, possibly several hours. If it takes more then a day, then that drive may need to be replaced.


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## Matt D. NickL (Sep 22, 2013)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

Wow, lot's of good stuff to know. Thanks. I bought it used, so a full format is probably best


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## sobeit (Nov 11, 2007)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*



Matt D. NickL said:


> Wow, lot's of good stuff to know. Thanks. I bought it used, so a full format is probably best


if you bought it used, then run a drive test on it before installing anything on it. create a bootable cd SeaTools for DOS tutorial


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## Matt D. NickL (Sep 22, 2013)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

Okay, so I started this about 13 hours ago, give or take a half hour. It's still looking like this, did I do this right and is it even working? Here is a screen grab. I did as Mastercheif suggested, I opened Disk Management and started the format via there.

http://img199.imageshack.us/img199/7945/jg54.jpg


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## Masterchiefxx17 (Feb 27, 2010)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

It shouldn't have taken even close to 13 hours. About an hour or two is normal.

Try and test to see if the hard drive is working correctly:

Please preform a hard drive test using this guide here: 

How to perform a Seagate's Seatools Test | Tech Support Forum


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## spunk.funk (May 13, 2010)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

You probably have a lot of *Bad Sectors*. Check Disk may fix them and the drive may be useable, but I wouldn't trust if with an OS. You should probably replace the HDD with a new one. You can download the ISO image for *Seatools* in my signature and burn the image to CD using *IMGBurn* also in my signature. Boot off of the newly created CD and run the short and Long tests on it. The Long tests may take more then 13 hours again and then fail the test.


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## Matt D. NickL (Sep 22, 2013)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

Did as you both suggested, this first link shows that my internal hard drive tests ''passed''.

http://img543.imageshack.us/img543/7079/25sj.jpg

This second one shows, just at the top there, that the only one the hard drive the program was reading was my internal one  So I went ahead and did the two tests on it, because why not?

http://img191.imageshack.us/img191/10/ftq9.jpg

Any idea how I can get the external USB HDD to show up on that list so I can test it? I'll try a couple things on my end to see if I can get it to show up


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## Matt D. NickL (Sep 22, 2013)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

A cleaner view of the application only reading the one device.

http://img19.imageshack.us/img19/49/7x5p.jpg


I'm going to plug the HDD into my daughter's laptop, which has Windows 8 on it. Then try to format it on her computer as she is away for the long weekend at her grandparents.


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## spunk.funk (May 13, 2010)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

The drive has most likely failed. If you are unsatisfied with this results, you can download the ISO image for* Drive Fitness* and burn the image to CD using *IMGBurn* and boot off of that CD. If it doesn't list that drive then it is a lost cause


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## Matt D. NickL (Sep 22, 2013)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

Damn. Okay, I'll give that a try. If that falls through oh well. Thank you everyone for the patient and helpful tips, I incredibly grateful for your time


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## Masterchiefxx17 (Feb 27, 2010)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

How old is the hard drive?


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## Matt D. NickL (Sep 22, 2013)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

Just under two years I believe. It held lots of movies before I got it a few days ago. I should have left it alone.


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## Masterchiefxx17 (Feb 27, 2010)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

Who is the manufacture of the hard drive?


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## Matt D. NickL (Sep 22, 2013)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

Ironically, Seagate. I had a chuckle when I looked earlier


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## Masterchiefxx17 (Feb 27, 2010)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

Your hard drive will have a five year warranty. I recommend you contact Seagate for a replacement:

Warranty & Replacements | Seagate


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## Matt D. NickL (Sep 22, 2013)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*



Masterchiefxx17 said:


> Your hard drive will have a five year warranty. I recommend you contact Seagate for a replacement:
> 
> Warranty & Replacements | Seagate


 
I gave that a try, turns out it's probably over 5 years old then because it wasn't under warranty? I asked the guy I bought it from, a work friend, and he said he bought it used also. Haha. So he had it two years, who knows how long the other guy had it?

So I don't think it would have worked because I'm not sure on their warranty practices, but there's no way I was able to get the orginal receipt for it if it was under warranty.

_Still_, on the other computer, I w_as_ _able_ to format it. It took about seven hours, give or take a half hour as I wasn't paying attention. So I can assume it has a lot of bad sectors because it took so long?

I want to buy a new one, but I'll wait to see what you suggest. I don't want to trust it with my backed up DVDs, but it did format successfully... I'm not sure, what do you think?


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## Matt D. NickL (Sep 22, 2013)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*



spunk.funk said:


> You probably have a lot of *Bad Sectors*. Check Disk may fix them and the drive may be useable, but I wouldn't trust if with an OS. You should probably replace the HDD with a new one. You can download the ISO image for *Seatools* in my signature and burn the image to CD using *IMGBurn* also in my signature. Boot off of the newly created CD and run the short and Long tests on it. The Long tests may take more then 13 hours again and then fail the test.


Now that it's been formatted, I can probably get it to read now and I'll be able to perform the short and long test. I'll give it a try tonight when I get home from work.

Thanks for the tips


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## Masterchiefxx17 (Feb 27, 2010)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

Run a Windows CHKDSK on that drive.


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## spunk.funk (May 13, 2010)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

Doing a *chkdsk /R* on freshly formatted HDD will do the same thing as a Normal (Full) Format. Same with a Long test of Seatools but this is a little more extensive. All 3 of these tests mark any bad sectors. Once a sector is marked bad, the next time a diagnostic test is run it will skip over this sector, as it is already marked. 7 hours isn't terrible. That means there were some bad sectors, but they were _fixed._ 
If you tried to run Seatools on a drive while it was being Formatted, it would not come up in the list because it was in use by another program. 
The HDD should last a little longer, run *chkdsk /R* if you feel it is acting sluggish Or Seatools.


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## Matt D. NickL (Sep 22, 2013)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

Just an update, thanks guys. I've put it in the closest and bought a new 2 TB HDD. Which formatted way quicker and I ran chkdsk and I'm all set now.


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## spunk.funk (May 13, 2010)

*Re: How long does it take to format a 931GB external harddrive?*

Great! Please mark this thread Solved in the Thread Tools at the top.


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## Masterchiefxx17 (Feb 27, 2010)

Glad you got it solved!


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