1. Initialising.. Mac Os Download
2. Initialising.. Mac Os Catalina

Note If you find fat32format a bit fiddly to use or these instructions a bit hard to follow you should try the replacement for fat32format. It is a Windows application with a GUI. Try it here

• Mac OSX detects a drive that needs to be initialized and automatically prompts you to initialize the drive. If you are prompted to initialize the drive, click Initialize. If you are not prompted to initialize the drive and you cannot find the drive in Finder, you will need to create a partition on the drive.
• 10.13 uses a new drive structure called APFS. If it is not a recognised format, a boot drive will need to be reformatted before it will recognise as a boot source. Is the external drive for just data storage, or is it a boot drive as well? If it is just an external drive for storing files, then.
• . Mac OS X 10.10 Yosemite-compatible. 2 Formatting the SSD Once you have booted into Recovery, use the Disk Utility to format the SSD. While the process of formatting your drive is simple in all cases, the appearance and steps within Disk Utility can vary based on the OS.

I recently got a SATA 250GB disk for testing FATLIB. It turns out that Windows XP won't let you format a volume bigger than 32GB with FAT32. I could use NTFS, but that's not what I FATlib supports. In fact, NTFS can only be written safely by Windows XP - there are as far as I know no other drivers for other OS's, unlike FAT which is supported by virtually anything.

As Microsoft put it here

You cannot format a volume larger than 32 gigabytes (GB) in size using the FAT32 file system during the Windows XP installation process. Windows XP can mount and support FAT32 volumes larger than 32 GB (subject to the other limits), but you cannot create a FAT32 volume larger than 32 GB by using the Format tool during Setup. If you need to format a volume that is larger than 32 GB, use the NTFS file system to format it. Another option is to start from a Microsoft Windows 98 or Microsoft Windows Millennium Edition (Me) Startup disk and use the Format tool included on the disk.

How to Initialize SSD/HDD on Mac. If you are a Mac user, you can also initialize your disk. This guide uses Mac OS X El Capitan or later. The procedure may be different from other OS versions. Connect your SSD to Mac with a USB adaptor. Select 'Initialize' when you receive this message - The disk you inserted was not readable by this.

Using Windows 98 obviously opens up other issues - It doesn't support USB 2.0 or SATA as far as I know. Formatting a huge disk will take ages. It suports IDE, but not 48bit LBA, which is required for drives greater than 137GB. Also, you need to patch format.exe and fdisk to work with disks greater than 64GB. Even then scandisk will corrupt large disks unless you disable it. It can be done, but basically, this is ancient 16 bit code, and using it on modern hardware is not a good idea. There is a port of mkdosfs from Linux to Win32. I tried it, and chkdsk complained about being unable to test a RAW filesystem. It also uses funny cluster sizes, only 4K for normal sized disks.

Actually, looking back at the Microsoft comment, if I could format the volume myself, all would be OK. Fat32 is pretty simple, so it occured to me to write a fast format routine to do the job. Note that the 32GB limit is a limit of the formatter in Windows XP. FAT32 itselft should be OK to 2TB, limited by a 32 bit sector count in the boot sector. XP comes with a partitioning tool, called Disk Management. It even has Wizards for partitoning. This should be a cinch.

I've tested this with a SATA disk as follows. Power off the computer and connect the disk. Power up again - check the Bios finds it. If you have a IDE or SATA disk, make sure you power off before connecting, USB and Firewire ones can be connected with the power on.

Click Start menu, select Run and enter diskmgmt.msc

If it asks you to initialise the disk, make sure you select a Basic disk, as opposed to a Dynamic.

There's a guide on Disk Management here You need to find the disk with unallocated space. Right click on it and select 'New Partition' and follow these steps, clicking 'Next' to get move on at each stage.

1. Partition Wizard starts, just click next to move on
2. Select Primary Partition.
3. Enter the maximum size for the Partition Size
4. Choose assign a drive letter. I used F:
5. Select 'Do not Format this partition'
6. There will be a dialog box, summarising all the previous stuff. Click Finish

Now you have a drive letter, this is what we will pass to the formatter

Now download a copy of fat32format. Extract the single EXE file to somewhere suitable, like C:.

Click Start->Run and enter

When the command prompt opens, type this - C: is the place you extracted the exe file to. Note if this sort of command line stuff makes your head hurt, you should probably give this a try instead

press enter and then type this. You need to replace f: with the drive letter you are trying to format.

You should see this displayed

Now when it says this, it really means it. If you format the boot sector, FATs and root directory will be filled with zeros. By typing pressing Y and hitting return, you're also absolving me of liability for whatever was on the disk before.

Assuming you don't bail out at this point you should see something like this -

This means that all has gone according to plan. It should take about 4 seconds per Terabyte to format the disk. You can run chkdsk f: at this point if you're curious, and see something like this -

This shows that my calculations match up with the ones inside Windows, which is good news

It is also possible to set the cluster size with a -cN parameter where N is the number of sectors per cluster. On a hard disk, which is the only sort we support, one sector is 512 bytes. The cluster size will be N times 512. I played around with this, and it seems that Windows XP supports small cluster sizes, except that chkdsk runs very slowly, presumably because it needs to read the huge FAT that results from these settings. Given the nature of FAT32, you can't reduce the cluster size such that the number of clusters is more than 2²⁸. I'd recommend using the default cluster sizes, which are the Microsoft recommended ones, unless you need to force them for testing or something

You can download either just the fat32format binary ~20K or the fat32format binary and source ~30K The source code can be compiled with Vistual Studio 6.0 or later. The current version number is 1.01.

There are a couple of things you need to know before running fat32format. You need to have Administrator rights on XP for it to work, since it opens the drive in raw write mode. You also need to make sure that there are no open files on the volume - if there are you will see a message like this -

Incidentally, if you are running admin and it still complains about open files, you can use Process Explorer to find out which process is guilty. Run it, Press Ctrl+F and enter the drive letter, e.g. E: and close any processes that have it open

This should make it a bit harder to lose data, assuming that you have at least one open file on the drives with data you want to keep. The drive that Windows is currently running from will have lots of files open - the pagefile, registry etc. I usually keep an Explorer.exe open in the root directory of any other drives to block format from running. Finally, it will only work with hard disks with 512 bytes per sector. If you have a DVD-Ram disk, format using the Windows formatter. If you have an optical disk drive bigger than 32GB, send me a sample and I'll port to it.

One last thing - fat32format is designed to format disks quickly. It doesn't check for bad sectors. If you need integrity checks, run a chkdsk /R f: after the format.

Finally and most importantly, it isn't possible to recover your data if you format the wrong disk, be careful using it. It is licensed under the GPL license - you may distribute source and binaries. You can build it into an open source application. If you want to build it into a closed source application you should approach me for licensing it under a BSD style license for a fee.

Update

If you find this software useful, please send me an some money via Paypal. I've had >170000 downloads, and a lot of emails, 99% successes. There are some fails, but they seem to be with hard drives which nothing else can write to either. If you have this, try to testing combinations to find out which is causing the problem. E.g. if you have Disks A and B and USB cases C and D, try the combinations AC, AD, BC and BD to work out which is bad. Return the bad component for a replacement, and you're good to go. If you bought a single unit, try getting it replaced.

Update 2

As of now, fat32format has worked on disks from 40GB to 2TB

Interfaces tested include IDE/PATA, SATA, eSATA, USB and Firewire

The formatted disks work on XP, Mac, Linux, the iPod (40gb), various Nas boxes and mediaplayers and Norton Ghost 2003

Formatting works on Windows 2000, Windows XP, and Windows Server 2003 and Vista. Note that Windows 9x/Me are not supported and do not work, but you can use the format.exe supplied with them instead

If it fails send me an email, please put FAT32 in the subject.

Update 3

If you have problems creating partitions bigger than 137GB on an ATA (IDE) disk connected to the motherboard, make sure you have SP1 or later and an LBA48 compatible bios. Check your motherboard site for a bios update.

Vista

fat32format works with Vista. The UI has changed a bit when creating drives and UAC makes the whole process a bit more cumbersome.

To create drive letters, Right Click on My Computer and Select Manage. UAC prompts you to escalate privileges, do so. You can right click on empty drives and Initialize them. Once you've done that you can create new volumes by right clicking on them and selecting New Simple Volume. Fast formatting them with NTFS is quick and should detect a completely dead drive.

If you have Vista there is a quick way to get an Admin cmd prompt. Click the Start button/ Windows flag in the bottom left of the screen and enter cmd like on XP but press Ctrl+Shift+Enter, you'll get a privilege escalation dialog click OK and you end up with an Admin command prompt, helpfully labelled as Administrator: C:Windowssystem32cmd.exe

This is the best way to run fat32format. It's always been Admin only, it's just that on XP most power users ran with Admin rights all the time.

Versions

1.02
A couple of people asked me about 64K cluster size. There are compatibility problems with this, as 16 bit set up programs sometimes assume that the cluster size will fit in a 16 bit integer. When calculating disk space, they thus end up with a value of zero. Fat32format disables cluster sizes bigger than 32K for this reason. However, some people need this, so the current version has the check disabled. You still need to force the cluster size by hand though, e.g. fat32format -c128 f:
1.03
Fixes for making partitions created above sector 0xffff bootable, and a cosmetic fix for the drive size printout when formatting drives bigger than 1TB ( 0x7fffffff sectors )
1.04
Fix for 'Failed to set partition info'. Some drives have no partition table, so you can't set the the partition type.
It was possible to set the cluster size too high resulting in too few clusters, or too high resulting in too many - fat32 must have between 2^16 and 2^28 clusters because of various compatibility considerations. Added code to check that.
Fixed an error where it crashes if people use /? to get help
1.05
Added support for bytes per sector values of other than 512
1.07
GPT support, fix for boot sector when using Windows AIK's bootsect.exe, FSCTL_ALLOW_EXTENDED_DASD_IO

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'Hi there, do you know how to initialize a new SSD in PC? I recently bought a new SSD, and I added to my computer, but it won't allow me to create a new partition. It keeps asking me to initialize the disk with an error message ' Disk Unknown is not initialized'. How can I fix this issue?'

Why You Need to Initialize Hard Drive/SSD

Are you having a similar problem with your SSD or HDD that the disk drive is not responding or stay with an unallocated condition? Do you know why the system keeps asking you or forcing you to initialize HDD/SSD? Here below are the reasons and causes that you are in and why you have to initialize SSD or HDD:

• New HDD or SSD does not show up in PC

When a brand new SSD or HDD is plugged into PC, it may not show up in This PC/Computer immediately. You have to initialize it so as to make it detectable and work for storing data.

• Disk Unknown Not Initialized error

An error message such as ' Disk 0 is unknown, not initialized, unallocated' may pop up if you try to open a solid-state disk or hard disk drive. This problem can occur to all Windows systems, including Windows 10/8/7, and the only way is to fix 'disk not initialized' error.

• Logical Disk Manager cannot access a disk since it's not initialized

Sometimes, if a hard disk or SSD is not initialized into MBR or GPT, the system may warn you with an error message 'You must initialize a disk before Logical Disk Manager can access it'.

Initialising.. Mac Os Download

How to Initialize SSD/HDD in Windows 10/8/7 (3 Ways)

If you add a brand new disk to your PC and it doesn't show up in File Explorer, you might need to add a drive letter or initialize it before using it. There are three ways to initialize SSD or HDD in Windows 10/8/7.

Solution 1. Initialize SSD/HDD with Free Software

You can initialize a disk easily and quickly with the help of EaseUS Partition Master Free. This free partition tool enables you to initialize a hard drive or an SSD with simple clicks. What's more, it is a superior free tool designed for everyone to manage partitions in Windows without data loss: beginners and experts alike.

Highlights

• Resize/move partition
• Merge partitions
• Wipe disk data

Follow the steps below to initialize HDD/SSD:

Step 1. Open EaseUS Partition Master. Connect the hard drive or SSD to PC.

Right-click the target HDD or SSD and select 'Initialize to MBR' or 'Initialize to GPT' accordingly.

Fig 1. Initialize to MBR:

Fig 2. Initialize to GPT:

Step 2. A pending operation of initializing disk to MBR or GPT disk will be added. Execute the operation and click 'Apply'.

Solution 2. Initialize SSD/HDD in Windows 10/8/7 with Disk Management

Here's how to initialize a new disk using Disk Management.

For Windows 10/8 users:

Step 1. Press 'Win + R', type diskmgmt.msc. and click 'OK' to open the Disk Management tool.

Step 2. Find the HDD or SSD that you need to initialize and right-click on it, and select 'Initialize Disk'.

Step 3. In the Initialize Disk dialog box, select the correct disk to initialize. And then click 'OK' to accept the default partition style, or you can change the partition style (GPT or MBR) as you want.

After this, reboot PC to keep all changes, and then your disk can be used properly.

For Windows 7 users:

Step 1. Right-click Computer and select 'Manage' to open Disk Management.

Step 2. Right-click on the not initialized disk (HDD or SSD) and select 'Initialize Disk'.

Step 3. Select the disk(s) to initialize in the Initialize Disk dialog box and set the disk partition as MBR or GPT.

Reboot PC, and then your disk will be initialized to create new partitions on it for storing new data.

Solution 3. Run CMD to Initialize HDD or SSD

If you are familiar with Command Prompt, you can try this method. Again, back up data into another safe disk or external storage device if you have important data on it.

Step 1. Press Win+R and type: diskpart and hit 'Enter'.

Step 2. Type the following commands in Command Prompt and press Enter after each command.

list disk
select disk 1
clean
convert gpt
create partition primary
format quick fs=ntfs
assign
exit

If you want to initialize to MBR disk, in the command, input convert mbr instead of convert gpt, then, you've finished the disk initialize process with the above commands.

Also read:How to Fix Disk Unknown Not Initialized Error.

How to Initialize SSD/HDD on Mac

If you are a Mac user, you can also initialize your disk. This guide uses Mac OS X El Capitan or later. The procedure may be different from other OS versions.

Step 1. Connect your SSD to Mac with a USB adaptor. Select 'Initialize' when you receive this message - The disk you inserted was not readable by this computer.

Step 2. Disk Utility will pop up if not, open Disk Utility and you shall see the SSD listed under External

Step 3. Select the SSD and then select 'Erase' on top of disk utility

Step 4. Input your desired name of the partition, if you plan to install Mac OS onto the partition, choose OS X Extended(Journaled) as the format. Choose GUID Partition Map as Scheme. After you click 'Erase'.

The SSD should now be visible on your desktop with the new name you gave it, as well as during the drive selection menu if you run an OS X installer.

Additional Information About Partition Styles - GPT and MBR

When you initialize a disk, you have to choose your partition style - MBR or GPT. MBR and GPT are two accessible partitions styles on Windows-based computers. Disks can be divided up into multiple parts called partitions. Each partition has to have a partition style - GPT or MBR. Windows uses the partition style to understand how to access the data on the disk. You can know their differences in detail in this table. What's more, you can convert MBR to GPT or GPT to MBR according to your needs.

Comparison	MBR (Master Boot Record)	GPT (GUID Partition Table)
Supported Partition Numbers	Maximum 4 partitions.	Maximum 128 partitions.
Supported Disk Capacity	2TB (for 512B sector), 16TB (for 4Kn sector)	No disk capacity limit
Supported Boot Mode	BIOS	UEFI
Supported OS	Windows 10/8/7, Linux Windows Server 2016/2012/2008 Windows XP/Vista (64bit for data only) macOS and modern Mac OS X	Windows 7/Windows XP/Vista

Conclusion

Initialize SSD is one of the essential tasks. Knowing how you can initialize SSD on Windows and Mac can solve the uninitialized issue with ease. Initializing SSD and HDD in Windows 10, 8, and 7 is possible using free software, Disk Management, and DiskPart. It only takes a few steps to complete this process.

SSD Initialization Related Questions

Here are some related questions about SSD initialization. If you still have a problem, you can read on to get additional help.

How do I initialize my new SSD?

To initialize a new SSD:

Step 1. Download EaseUS Partition Master. Connect the hard drive or SSD to PC

Initialising.. Mac Os Catalina

Step 2. Right-click the target HDD or SSD and select 'Initialize to MBR' or 'Initialize to GPT'.

Step 3. Execute the operation and click 'Apply'.

Do I need to initialize SSD?

When a brand new SSD or HDD is plugged into PC, it may not show up in This PC immediately. You have to initialize it so as to make it detectable and work for storing data.

How do I initialize my Samsung SSD?

To initialize Samsung SSD in Disk Management:

Step 1. Press Win + R, type diskmgmt.msc. and click OK to open the Disk Management tool.

Step 2. Find the HDD or SSD that you need to initialize and right-click on it and select Initialize Disk.

Step 3. Select the correct disk to initialize. And then click OK.