If you need to format USB flash drive on computer installed with Windows or Mac OS system? Check or not check Quick Format and click Start button (Windows 7). Wait for USB flash drive formatted successfully. Part 2: Erase and Format USB Drive to on Mac.

My pc is located in my basement hanging the the floor joist on a garage storage rack. I have 20ft HDMI cable, four 6ft usb cables, and speaker wires fished up the wall in my living room from the basement.

•, the hard drive manager included with all versions of Windows. • Note: In Windows 10 and Windows 8, the gives you the quickest access to Disk Management. You can also in any version of Windows, but is probably easier unless you're really quick with. • See if you're not sure which of those several versions of Windows is installed on your computer. • With now open, locate the drive you want to format from the list at the top. • Important: Is the drive you want to format not listed, or does an Initialize Disk or Initialize and Convert Disk Wizard window appear? If so, it means you still need to partition the drive.

See and then return here to continue. • Note: Formatting the C drive, or whatever letter happens to identify the drive that Windows is installed on, can not be done from Disk Management. Or from anywhere else in Windows.

See for instructions on how to format your primary drive. • Once located, right-click or tap-and-hold on the drive and choose Format. A 'Format [drive letter]:' window should appear. • Warning: Obviously, it's very, very important to choose the correct drive to format.

Once started, you can't stop a format without causing problems. • If you're formatting a drive that has data on it, double-check that it's the correct drive by looking at the drive letter and then checking in Explorer that it is, in fact, the correct drive. • If you're formatting a new drive, the drive letter assigned should be unfamiliar to you and the File System will probably be listed as RAW.

• In the Volume label: textbox, either give a name to the drive or leave the name as is. If this is a new drive, Windows will assign the New Volume. • I recommend giving a name to the drive so it's easier to identify in the future. For example, if you're planning on using this drive to store movies, name the volume Movies. • For File system: choose NTFS unless you have a specific need to choose another file system. • is always the best file system option to use in Windows unless you have a specific need to choose. Other FAT file systems are only available as options on drives 2 GB and smaller.

• Set the Allocation unit size: to Default unless there's a specific need to customize it. There are very few reasons to change this.

• In Windows 10, 8, and 7, the Perform a quick format option is checked by default but I recommend unchecking the box so a 'full' format is done. • Yes, a quick format will format the hard drive considerably faster than a standard format, but the benefits usually outweigh the short-term cost (your time) of the full format. • Windows 10, 8, 7, Vista: In a standard format, each on the hard drive is checked for errors (great for new and older drives) and a one-pass is also performed (great for previously used drives). A quick format skips the bad sector search and basic.

Photo by Sharon Vaknin/CNET If you need to expand your storage space with an external hard drive and you use both Mac and PC, you'll likely run into a few obstacles. Hard drives advertised as being compatible with Windows and Mac OS may have misled you into thinking you could actually use one hard drive for both computers. You can, but not out of the box. Most external hard drives (HD) are sold in a format called NTFS, which is designed to work with Windows. Macs read and write to a different format, called HFS+.

Another format, called FAT32 is compatible with both OS platforms. Here's a look at how the different HD format types function: FAT32 (File Allocation Table) - Natively read/write FAT32 on Windows and Mac OS X.

- Maximum file size: 4GB - Maximum volume size: 2TB NTFS (Windows NT File System) - Natively read/write NTFS on Windows. - Read-only NTFS on Mac OS X - Native NTFS support can be enabled in Snow Leopard and above but has proven instable. - Maximum file size: 16 TB - Maximum volume size: 256TB HFS+ (Hierarchical File System, aka Mac OS Extended) - Natively read/write HFS+ on Mac OS X - Required for Time Machine - Maximum file size: 8 - Maximum volume size: 8EiB Isn't FAT32 the obvious solution? According to the list above, formatting your hard drive to FAT32 so that you can read and write on either OS seems like the obvious solution. The video and directions below will guide you through the process, but before you format your HD to FAT32, beware of these drawbacks. • FAT32 offers no security, unlike NTFS, which allows you to set permissions. If your HD gets into the wrong hands, that person will be able to access your data.