How to format usb drive on windows 10 using command prompt. File systems fat, fat8, fat16, fat32 and ntfs explained. However, since it is the most widely used pc operating system, most other operating systems file systems are at least readcompatible with microsoft windows. But in windows 7 my only choices are exfat or ntfs. Fat32 is a filesystem and has nothing much to do with the operating system. Click the format popup menu, then choose one of the following.
Click the erase tab to identify the current format. Also, fat32 volumes cannot be accessed properly if the computer is started by using another operating system for example, a windows 95 or ms dos. Windows builtin formatting utility doesnt allow you to select the create an msdos startup disk option when formatting a usb drivethe option is grayed out in windows 7 and not available at all in windows 8 and 10. After formatting a floppy disk, format displays the following message. How to format a usb flash drive on a mac to msdos fat. Format a disk for windows computers in disk utility on mac. Select the drive you want to format and click erase button.
Originally 86 dos, written by tim paterson of seattle computer products, dos was a rough clone of cpm for 8086 based hardware. Is there a way to fat32 format an entire 80 gig hdd in dos. File allocation table 32 fat32 fat32 is the oldest of the three file systems available to windows. The flash drive being used in this process will be formatted. How to format a usb flash drive on windows 10 windows. The following are some of what i have triedchecked in windows 7. How to format drive for mac and windows computer technician blog. Connect the usb fash drive to the mac os x computer. This will show you how to create a flash drive that is able to boot your computer into a ms dos environment. Windows 7 does not recognize fat32 and exfat formatted usb. Insert the flash drive or hard drive you want to format for windows.
Locate and rightclick on your usb flash drive or external hard drive, select format. No iteration of dos, or, as far as i know, windows, is capable of fat32 formatting a partition larger than 32gb in size, at least not with their respective default utilities. Fat or fat 32 file system is the option selected by default for formatting a usb flash drive. Just because you dont see the option to format your hard drive to fat32 in windows user interface doesnt mean the ability is gone completely. If the drives format comes up as msdos fat or, less likely, exfat, you. Format an external hard drive to fat32 using command prompt. Set the usb to fat32, tick quick format and click ok to confirm. This is because the file format is pretty old and has some severe limitations. Format a disk for windows computers in disk utility on mac apple. How to format a disk or drive in ms dos create and boot to a bootable diskette with cdrom support if your system has a floppy drive and you are unable to boot to the cd drive, follow the instructions below to create a bootable diskette with cd drivers.
Jul 19, 2017 how to make external hard drive work with mac and pc set up guidehow to use hdhow to use hd duration. Format command information for ms dos and the windows command line. Type exit and hit enter to close the program when diskpart reports it has successfully formatted the usb. Format command examples, options, switches, and more. Format windows nt filesystem msdos fat mac youtube. In 1982, microsoft began licensing dos to other oems that ported it to their custom x86 hardware and ibm pc clones. Youd only want to do a quick format on a drive you know has no bad sectors. The big advantage of the fat32 file system is that its very old. Fat32 offers nearuniversal interoperability with virtually every computing system on the planet. And dont forget to create a startup disk with fat32 support. Click the scheme popup menu, then choose master boot record. In the sidebar, select the disk you want to format to use with windows computers.
Sep 19, 2011 ms dos fat this is disk utilitys name for the fat32 filesystem. In recent versions of windows 10, you will no longer see fat32 as the format option for drives that are larger than 32gb. It was introduced all the way back in windows 95 to replace the older fat16 file system used in msdos and windows 3. Whats the difference between fat32, exfat, and ntfs. Ms dos, the original version of windows 95, and windows nt 4. Easy way to format usb drive on windows and mac isunshare. The exfat file system is the successor to fat32 in the fat family of file systems. The media descriptor byte is located in the bpb of the boot sector at offset 21 15h and in the first byte of each fat on the disk. The fat file system is best for drives andor partitions under approximately 200 mb, because fat starts out with very little overhead. In the fat32 format window, select the drive to format and type a volume label if you want to.
Ovi3kvn may show little similarity to the original. With the release of windows 95, this file system was introduced as a replacement for the older fat16 format used in windows 3 and ms dos. It is the most common version available of the fat file allocation table file system. How to format usb drives larger than 32gb with fat32 on. Oct 07, 2010 the full format does and thats why it takes so long.
For instance, some of the modern video doorbells you buy require your storage devices to be in the fat32 format. Choose one of the following windows compatible file system formats if you are formatting a disk to use with windows. Select the quick format option, and then click the start button. Click on the icon for the sd card in the sidebar on the left. How to format usb flash drive to fat32 in mac os x. Floppy disk is not accessible, not formatted, or not. Considering how easy formatting is from within windows, the format command isnt often used in the command prompt in windows. The exfat file system has three central design goals see list below. A window pops up to warn you that all data on the drive will be lost. In ms dos, the format command is often used after using the fdisk command. What are the difference between msdos fat32 format and. Ntfs windows nt file system readwrite ntfs from native windows. To use the diskette, insert it into the floppy disk drive and then restart the system.
It is also used in modern microsoft operating systems as an alternate filename to the long filename for compatibility with legacy programs. Formatting with this tool is much quicker than the command. Some experienced users or administrators prefer to use command lines to execute some operations on windows pc. But you can do a quick format with the regular dos command. This specification describes the exfat file system and provides all the information necessary for implementing the exfat file system. To maintain backwardcompatibility with legacy applications on dos and windows 3. If you work a lot in realmode ms dos, fat32 is considerably slower than fat16. The fat32 file systems age has advantages and disadvantages. Number of clusters format will immediately stop processing if it decides that the above requirements cannot be met using the specified cluster size. A1 in most windows systems while formatting a usb stickflash drive, file system choices are presented to you ntfs, fat, fat32 or exfat. The fat file system was first introduced in the days of msdos way back in 1981. Run boot camp assistant again and be happy because it finally works like a charm. Preparing your drive tesla dashcam advice, recommendations.
Rightclick on windows icon and select windows powershell admin, click yes to open it. Dec 25, 2016 your choice is ms dos aka fat32 or exfat and i go over the difference in the video. Apr 16, 2020 a fat32 file system is the oldest of the three ones available for windows. How to format usb flash drive using fatfat32 ntfsexfat. Your choice is ms dos aka fat32 or exfat and i go over the difference in the video. To be able to use a new disk, you must first use this command to format the disk. Thank you for helping us maintain cnet s great community.
From the drop down menu of format, select ms dos fat. How to format a flash drive for mac and pc compatibility in macos. With the release of windows 95, this file system was introduced as a replacement for the older fat16 format used in windows 3 and msdos. How to format a usb flash drive in windows support. A black screen with the microsoft windows 95 startup menu appears. Oct 16, 2017 the format command creates a new root directory and file system for the disk. Fat had been the standard format for floppy disks and hard drives all through the dos years, and versions of windows up to and including windows. All of my usb sticks and sd cards work fine in the other side same hardware. Therefore this problem does not occur with these older operating systems. The filename convention is limited by the fat file system. Ntfs compression is not supported for allocation unit sizes above 4096. Im fat32 is not supported by ms dos versions before v7. Microsoft purchased it and licensed it to ibm for use with microsoft s ibm pc language products.
Will a hard drive formatted as msdos fat work on pc. Choose this format if the size of the disk is 32 gb or less. Be absolutely sure youve selected your flash drive and not the hard disk. What format for my external drive allows use with mac and windows. Click the format menu, then choose either msdos fat or exfat. Click on start and ok to commence the formatting process. Msdos fat and then erase 5 copy the upgrade files to the formatted usb flash drive. So whatever os it is, fat32 is fat32, and theyre the same. In windows, older versions, you could format fat also known as fat16 and fat32.
Many ms dos only programs requiring direct hardware access will not run in a windows 98 ms dos cli window. After formatting your flash drive, you can install a full working version of ms dos to let you run games or system utilities. Format to fat32 using cmd, diskpart or powershell command line. Page includes format command availability, syntax, and examples. Use of the format command will result in the loss of all data on the drive being formatted.
So if your question was whats the difference between ms dos fat and windows fat, the answer would be ms dos uses fat16 while windows uses fat32. It can also check for bad areas on the disk, and it can delete all data on the disk. Instructions on how to format a usb flash drive into fat32msdos fat in windows. Go to applications utilities double click and open disk utility. Fat file systems restrict the number of clusters to no more than 65526. Note that the fat and fat32 files systems impose the following restrictions on the number of clusters on a volume. How to format usb flash drive using fatfat32ntfsexfat. Msdos bootable flash drive create windows 7 help forums.
Fat32 supports 512, 1024, 2048, 4096, 8192, 16 k, 32 k, 64 k, 128 k, 256 k. Will a hard drive formatted as ms dos fat work on pc. To format a usb flash drive to fat32 in mac os x follow these steps. From the window, select fat32 from the drop down bar under file system. Fat32 file allocation table readwrite fat32 from both native windows and native mac os x. Windows 98 introduced a utility to convert existing hard disks from fat16 to fat32. Note that apple makes it a bit confusing as msdos fat is really windows fat32. Please backup all of your data on the drive beforehand. Format to fat32 for usb or external hard drive in windows. How to make external hard drive work with mac and pc set up guidehow to use hdhow to use hd duration. It will help to get a clean usb flash drive formatted in preferred file system, fat32, ntfs, msdosfat etc. There are some other less commonly used format command switches, too, like a. If you partition and format a drive in os x lion for use with both systems, windows and os x, os x lists the format as ms dos fat but it really formats the drive as fat32. Fat32 file systems restrict the number of clusters to between 65527 and 4177917.
Afaik, ms dos used fat16 as its default filesystem, while fat32 was first introduced by win95 osr2, or win97 as known by others. File system formats available in disk utility on mac apple. Mar 30, 2020 altogether, three sd card formatting approaches are given here to help format sd memory card effortlessly, including format sd card using cmd command prompt, windows utility and thirdparty sd card formatting tool in windows 10, 8. Windows 98 supports dualbooting between windows 98 and earlier ms dos operating systems such as ms dos 6. Starting with fat32 on a mac, known as msdos fat, this file system is fully compatible with all versions of windows and mac operating systems. However, if the file was located on a fat partition, and the system is restarted under ms dos, the file can be undeleted. This will be accomplished by using the hp flash utility and the windows 98 ms dos system files. Right click on your usb drive and click on format option. Follow these steps to format a drive in fat32 in windows 10. Ms dos fat and then erase 5 copy the upgrade files to the formatted usb flash drive. Some time in last summer, i installed windows 10 in a separate partition. Click the pulldown menu alongside format and select msdos fat. On windows 10, the ability to format a usb flash drive can come in handy in a number of scenarios. Ms dos fat this is disk utilitys name for the fat32 filesystem.
Format to fat32 for usb or external hard drive in windows 10. Fat32 is one of the most popular and versatile file formats for a drive. How to format external hard drive to fat32 in windows. Insert usb flash drive into one of the usb ports on. The format command is used to format a partition to a file system. Apr 16, 2018 with ms dos and windows 95, you do not have to set the media descriptor byte. Make sure the data on the drive to be formatted is.