Dec 03, 2020 • Filed to: Answer Hard Drive Problems • Proven solutions
If you're used to formatting a hard disk drive (HDD) you'll notice that formatting an SSD is slightly different. SSDs use different technology than an HDD, so the formatting function is a different process for each. That's why it is important to make sure that the box marked Quick Format is checked before. Simply open the case, then plug the bare drive into the SATA connector and close it back up again. Congrats, you now have an external USB-C hard drive or SSD! There are tons of uses for external hard drives, and they make exceptional backup media for holding your System Image backups.
Solid-state drives are now the best option to use in most computers. It's fast, lightweight, and makes use of flash memory, making it less likely to wear down, unlike hard disk drives. If you've currently changed your laptop's drive to an SSD but it won't show on your computer, you may need to initialize it first.
Initialize SSD/Hard Drive
Initializing your drive is the process of preparing it for use of an operating system. It is essential if you're encountering problems with your drive upon first using it. This problem may be in the form of your brand new SSD not being read by your computer. Or it could be in the prompt saying Disk Unknown Not Initialized. It could also be in the error prompt You must initialize a disk before Logical Disk Manager can access it. All these problems would be solved when you initialize your disk. However, take note that doing so would erase all of the data in the disk. It's advisable to do if your disk is brand new or empty.
How to Initialize an SSD on Windows 10
In the following paragraphs, we'll tell you how to Initialize an SSD on Windows 10. We'll also recommend some third-party softwares that will do the job for you in case you're not confident in performing the task on your own.
Method 1. Launch Disk Management
1. Press on Windows key + R to launch Run. Then put in diskmgmt.msc > OK to open Disk Management.
2. Locate your hard drive of concern. Right-click on it to view the options. Select Initialize Disk.
3. It will tell you whether the disk is offline or online. Set it to Online by making a right-click. How to put two videos together in imovie.
4. An Initialize Disk Window will pop up. Again, click on the disk you want to initialize and hit OK. This is where you assign the partition style.
5. Once the process is finished, you may need to restart your PC to see if your SDD was initialized.
Method 2. Use Diskpart Commands
1. On Start menu or in the search bar, type in diskpart, and hit Enter. This will launch the Diskpart command line.
https://oouo.over-blog.com/2021/01/is-call-of-duty-modern-warfare-online-only.html. 2. Type the command below, pressing Enter after every line.
list disk
select disk #
convert MBR/GPT.
NOTE: This will initialize the chosen disk to MBR or GPT. Replace # with the drive letter
3.Type in the commands below on the command-line if you intend the primary partition to be made on MBR.
list disk
select disk #
clean
create partition primary
format quick fs=ntfs
assign
exit.
4.Type in the following command if you want to make a primary partition on GPT.
list disk
select disk #
clean
convert gpt
create partition primary format quick fs=ntfs
assign
exit.
5. You may need to reboot to see the changes take effect.
Method 3. Use a third-party partition software
If either of the two methods mentioned above doesn't work, you can always resort to using a third-party partition software. All softwares that will be mentioned currently have both free and paid versions. They are all capable of initializing your disk plus many other features.
1.Paragon Partition Manager
Paragon Partition Manager simplifies things to the average users. The graphics in the interface help visualize the partition's remaining capacity and partitions. In just a click, you can launch a whole set of options and queue them up until you are ready to apply them. It also allows users to convert drives without actually formatting them. It's an all-in-one solution to any of your disk partition needs.
2.Acronis Disk Director 12
One of the defining features of Acronis Disk Director is its versatility. It boasts of many advanced features that you won't think you'll need. Apart from the essentials of any disk management software, it offers more. It allows users to convert partitions and to clone schemes. Most importantly, it's also highly compatible with many operating systems.
3.AOMEI Partition Assistant
AOMEI is a household name when it comes to partition management softwares. I'm fully equipped with the features you would expect any disk management software to have. With AOMEI, you can copy, create, delete, resize, and rename partitions with ease. The software's interface is highly commendable for its clean and crisp design. It's easy to navigate while keeping things professional-looking.
Always remember that the process of initializing wipes out the disk of all the files. It's only performed if your SSD is brand new or never been used before. If you find that your new SSD is not recognized by your computer, you may initialize it first. https://mulrs.over-blog.com/2021/01/firefox-update-for-mac-10-7-5.html. This can be done through the previous solutions mentioned above.
Video Tutorial on How to Fix Unallocated Hard Disk Drive
What's Wrong with Drive
- Recover Your Drive
- Fix Your Drive
- Format/Wipe Drive
- Know Your Drive
Updated on November 9th, 2020
How to partition an external hard drive? This post will show you different solutions to partition an external hard drive without data loss as well as how to repartition external hard disk with correct 4K alignment. You can follow this tutorial to partition or format external HDD under Windows XP/Vista/7/8/10.
External hard drive, also known as portable hard drive or removable hard drive, is a storage device used outside of computer which is connected via a USB cable. Some external hard drive gets power from computer itself via data cable, and some may has a AC wall to derive power.
3.AOMEI Partition Assistant
AOMEI is a household name when it comes to partition management softwares. I'm fully equipped with the features you would expect any disk management software to have. With AOMEI, you can copy, create, delete, resize, and rename partitions with ease. The software's interface is highly commendable for its clean and crisp design. It's easy to navigate while keeping things professional-looking.
Always remember that the process of initializing wipes out the disk of all the files. It's only performed if your SSD is brand new or never been used before. If you find that your new SSD is not recognized by your computer, you may initialize it first. https://mulrs.over-blog.com/2021/01/firefox-update-for-mac-10-7-5.html. This can be done through the previous solutions mentioned above.
Video Tutorial on How to Fix Unallocated Hard Disk Drive
What's Wrong with Drive
- Recover Your Drive
- Fix Your Drive
- Format/Wipe Drive
- Know Your Drive
Updated on November 9th, 2020
How to partition an external hard drive? This post will show you different solutions to partition an external hard drive without data loss as well as how to repartition external hard disk with correct 4K alignment. You can follow this tutorial to partition or format external HDD under Windows XP/Vista/7/8/10.
External hard drive, also known as portable hard drive or removable hard drive, is a storage device used outside of computer which is connected via a USB cable. Some external hard drive gets power from computer itself via data cable, and some may has a AC wall to derive power.
Traditional & SSD external hard drive
You can take external hard drive as a regular internal hard drive which has been put into a protective case and plugged outside of computer. Thus you can buy a hard drive enclosure and put internal hard drive in it to make an external hard disk. External hard drive is produced in various storage capacities and connected via USB, FireWire, eSATA or wirelessly.
What is solid state external hard drive (external SSD)? SSD (Solid State Drives) has become much more common in recent years. External SSD is putting an SSD in a hard drive enclosure, which is ideal to user who prefer to lightweight, removable and speedy storage media. It is much smaller and lighter than traditional external hard disk. Besides, it does not have moving parts inside and thus it is more quiet and stable.
What does an external hard drive do?
Storing data is the basic responsibility for external hard drive and you may need an external HDD due to following factors:
- Provide additional storage. External hard disk is able to provide large amount of storage space and hold various data for you. You can store documents, photo, videos, programs, or even operating system on it.
- It is very portable. You can store data on the device and take it to any place you like.
- It can be used on different computers. You can connect it to any computer you need in order to transfer or share files.
- Back up data. Since portable hard drive provides large space, you can create a backup for data on local disk to and keep backup copy on removable disk.
- Create bootable disk. Usually we create bootable disk using flash drive, but you can still create removable disk as bootable disk if a flash drive is not available for the moment.
In general, newly bought external hard drive is already partitioned and formatted to one big partition. You can store data on the drive directly without taking extra steps to partition it. However, many users would like to two or more partitions on external hard disk in order to manage data in a better way. For example, some users want to create partitions with different file system so that the disk can be compatible with other operating system.
If you are one of those who want to partition or repartition an external hard drive, you can try the following two methods. Method 1 partitions external hard disk using Windows built-in Disk Management and takes Windows 10 Disk Management console as an example; Methods 2 partitions external disk using Windows partition manager software – Eassos PartitionGuru. This method can also be used to partition a hard drive, SD card, USB flash drive, virtual disk, SSD and so on. Let's see how these methods works step by step. How to play skyrim.
Method 1: Partition an external hard drive using Windows 10 Disk Management
Step 1: Connect the external hard drive you want to add partition to your computer and make sure it can be recognized correctly.
Step 2: Open Disk Management. Right-click Start menu and select Disk Management.
Note: If your computer is running other Windows system, such as Windows 7, you can access Disk Management by right-clicking Computer and clicking Manage. Then a window pops up and shows information on two panes. Click Disk Management on the left part.
Step 3: Find the external hard drive you want to partition and right-click it to select Shrink Volume.
Step 4: Enter the size you want to shrink and click Shrink button.
Note: the size you enter in this step is using MB as the unit, thus if you want to shrink 100GB, you should type 10000. Then you'll see unallocated disk space on the external hard disk and you can create a new partition on it.
Step 5: Right-click on the unallocated disk space and select 'New Simple Volume' from context menu.
Step 6: The 'New Simple Volume Wizard' pops up and it will guides you step by step to create new partition. You can follow this onscreen instruction to create partition. During the process, you will be asked to decide partition size, file system type, drive letter, etc. It's OK to follow suggested settings.
Method 2: Partition an external hard disk using Eassos PartitionGuru
Eassos PartitionGuru is free Windows partition manager software and it can be used to create, resize, clone, backup, format, erase and hide partitions as well as partition hard drive, external disk, USB flash drive, SD card, etc. If this section, you can see two examples to partition storage media: Case 1 partitions disk without affecting existing data, which is suitable to disk that contains data: Case 2 deletes all partitions and recreates partitions again with correct 4K sector alignment, which is fast and easy.
Case 1: Partition external hard disk without data loss
Step 1: Install and launch Eassos PartitionGuru from your computer and connect external via USB cable.
Step 2: Right-click on the external disk and select 'Split Partition' from context menu. This function is able to split one partition into two without data loss.
Step 3: Enter partition size for these two partitions and click Start button.
Step 4: PartitionGuru prompts operations to be done, and click Yes button to continue.
Step 5: Wait for a while and the process completes.
Case 2: Quickly repartition external disk / hard drive with correct 4K alignment
Note: this process removes all partitions from the disk being partitioned, causing data loss. Please make sure you've backed up all data on that disk.
Step 1: Launch Eassos PartitionGuru, select the external hard disk you want to partition and click 'Quick Partition' button from toolbar.
Step 2: Select partition table type, partition number, size, etc. for the hard drive and click 'OK' button.
How To Make An External Ssd Hard Drive
Note: the function of 'Align Partitions to Integral Multiples of Sectors' is setting 4K alignment for all partitions, and it is selected by default; and there is no need to change the default value for this option, as it already meets the requirement of 4K sector alignment.
Transfer From Hdd To Ssd
Step 3: The programs starts partitioning the disk and formats each partitions quickly.
