Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!samsung!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!sdd.hp.com!ucsd!ucbvax!agate!pepto-bismol.berkeley.edu!vojta From: vojta@pepto-bismol.berkeley.edu (Paul Vojta) Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware Subject: Re: Low-level format of hard disk Summary: Trying to stem the tide of Usenet misinformation Message-ID: <1990Oct10.184904.29821@agate.berkeley.edu> Date: 10 Oct 90 18:49:04 GMT References: Sender: usenet@agate.berkeley.edu (USENET Administrator) Organization: U.C. Berkeley Lines: 18 In article <3915.2711b5f6@cc.curtin.edu.au> sschnellm@cc.curtin.edu.au writes: > >If the machine is an AT, the disk will have been formatted by the >manufacturer before shipping. Regardless of machine, practically all hard disks have been formatted by the manufacturer before shipping. In article jc58+@andrew.cmu.edu (Johnny J. Chin) writes: >The only problem I know of when you excessively format a hard drive is the >wear you place on the heads. This has caused some drives to pre-maturely >fail. But then again, the drives that have failed on were ones where the >user uses the drive a lot and low-level formatted every 3 months. WEAR on the heads? They never touch the platters, except possibly when turning the machine off. --Paul Vojta, vojta@math.berkeley.edu