Type “ select disk X” at the end replacing “X” with the drive number and press the enter key on your keyboard to select the disk.Ī confirmation message reading ‘Disk X is now the selected disk’ will be displayed.Ĩ. This will list out all the available hard drives on the system including their sizes with other additional information.ħ. Next, type the command “ list disk” and press enter. The diskpart function lets you format your drives.Ħ. Once Command Prompt has launched as an administrator, type diskpart in the command line and press enter to run. Note: A User Account Control pop-up asking permission to allow Command Prompt to make changes to the system will appear, click on Yes to grant permission.ĥ. Right-click on the “ Command Prompt” option to open the drop-down menu and select “ Run as administrator”.
Click on the search bar or press “ Windows + S” on your keyboard and type “ Command Prompt”.Ĥ.
Note: In the above screenshot, the drive letter for the connected “USB Drive” is “F” and the drive “Recovery” is “D”.ģ. Plugin and make sure the hard disk/USB drive is connected properly to your system.Ģ. Open file explorer ( Windows key + E) and note the corresponding drive letter of the hard drive that needs to be formatted. Method 1: Format hard drive to FAT32 using Command Promptġ. The list includes running a few commands in the command prompt or powershell, using third-party applications like FAT32 Format and EaseUS.
There are a couple of methods via which you can format a hard drive to FAT32.
The File Allocation Table (FAT) system itself is widely used for USB drives, flash memory cards, floppy disks, super floppies, memory cards and external hard drives that are supported by digital cameras, camcorders, PDAs, media players, or mobile phones with an exception of Compact Disc (CD) and Digital Versatile Disc (DVD). What is a File Allocation Table (FAT) system and FAT32?
Today, we will go over a couple of methods on how to format your hard drive to the FAT32 system. Therefore, formatting a hard drive to FAT32 can make it accessible and thus can be used across platforms and in various devices. The FAT32 system in particular has universal support and works on almost all operating systems available for personal computers. A few file systems you might be aware of include FAT, exFAT, NTFS, etc.Įach of these systems has its own advantages and disadvantages. A file system controls how the above tasks (storing, indexing, and retrieving) are performed. The way files and data are stored, indexed on a hard drive, and retrieved back to the user is far more complex than you might think.