Formatting Notes

Sectors – smallest physical storage unit on the disk
- In windows, size of each sector is 512 bytes

Low level formatting - is a hard disk operation that should make recovering data from your
storage devices impossible once the operation is complete
Low-level formatting is a procedure where you write data directly to the storage medium,
bypassing the filesystem layer. You do not care if the hard disk has one partition or more, NTFS
or BTRFS or anything else. You are using the device driver, which can be IDE or SCSI or SATA
or others, and you're writing data to physical sectors. More importantly, low level formatting will
write to each and every bit on the storage device, making sure the old states are destroyed forever,
and with them, any trace of former data previously stored.
Performing one low-level formatting operation is known as one-pass format. Some security
consultants and experts and paranoids might recommend you perform three or more passes, to
make absolutely sure no trace of old data can ever be retrieved. Statistically, this is a total overkill,
but the choice is entirely yours.
Low Level Formatting

Low level formatting is used to initiate a hard drive and prepare it for data by creating the actual
sectors and tracks on the drive, as well as the control structures needed to read and write data on
the drive. A low level format is often completed by the manufacturer of the hard drive, for
instance, in cases where you purchased new hard drives to install into existing computers. In
some cases, however, you may need to run a low level format after installing the drive into the
computer before you can install an actual operating system.
After a drive has a low level format ran on it the first time, this is the only time the drive will
actually contain no data. Later, if a low level format is ran on a drive with existing it, it is erased
and lost forever. Basically, a low level format “resets” the drive to its original “out-of-the-box”
state.
Low level formatting could require specialized software and does take a much longer time to
complete. It is for this reason, it is recommended to have a professional data recovery and
formatting business perform any low level formatting you need, as a data check is also
performed afterwards to ensure there is no remaining data that could be recovered.
High Level Formatting
High level formatting can be performed on a hard disk only after the sectors and tracks have
been formatted using a low level format (see below). This type of formatting is where actual
data, like the operating system is written onto the drive sectors to create file and system
structures so you can use the drive to install other applications and store data and files.
For instance, if you have an existing drive, but you want to format it before upgrading the
operating system, you would run a high level format. The format operation overwrites the
existing data structures on the drive and creates new ones, like a new boot sector. Another
situation where high level formatting is used, is whenever you create new partitions on a hard
drive and want to format them in order to be able to use them to install apps or store data.
It is worth noting a high level format does not fully erase pre-existing data from the drive. The
data is simply hidden on the drive since the paths to access the data were erased. The data is
often recoverable using specialized recovery programs, such as, those used by our data recovery
service in Toronto.
A high-level format is commonly done if a user wishes to erase the

hard drive and reinstall the operating system back onto the hard
drive. If errors are present on the hard drive, or a high-level format
is unable to be completed, a low-level format may need to be done
first.
High-level formatting is the process of setting up an empty file system on a disk partition or logical
volume and, for PCs, installing a boot sector. This is a fast operation, and is sometimes referred to
as quick formatting.
The entire logical drive or partition may optionally be scanned for defects, which may take
considerable time.
Why Partition?
Your hard drive is simply a collection of plates that store data by means of
magnetic read/write heads that run around the disk. Look at the image below
for an example:
The background of the image is a piece of the surface of the drive platter, on
which all your data is stored. It’s difficult to imagine how, in that space, there
are tens of thousands – if not millions – of bits of data stored. If you can
imagine that, you can realize just how fragile the drive itself is, and how it can
easily be corrupt. Are you willing to take such a risk?
If you’re willing to risk data loss because you believe your hard drive is
durable, you probably don’t know how a hard drive works, or believe that the
data you’re protecting isn’t worth the resources you would put into new
storage.
First of all, hard drives aren’t as durable as you may believe. Read/write heads
on hard drives are so close to their platters (less than the thickness of a hair on
your head) that you’d be amazed at how it manages not to ever touch the
surface. Actually, there’s an ultra-thin lubricant (much like teflon) on every
platter, and read/write heads tend to skid off when they do that. Sometimes,
though, the read/write head touches the drive platter at such an angle in
which the lubricant really won’t have much of an effect and will scratch the
drive.
Then there’s another problem. Did you know that ambient air cannot enter a
hard drive? Even the smallest speck of dust will likely corrupt data on your
drive and scratch the platter so one entire sector of it will turn bad and refuse
to run. This kind of thing happens every day to unsuspecting users of any
device that has a hard disk. You see, the hard disk does allow for a small
amount of air to enter it, so it can equalize with the atmospheric pressure. The
drive has a filter around it to ensure that no particles get trapped inside. After
a while, this filter isn’t going to be as efficient as it used to be

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Sectors – smallest physical storage unit on the disk

- In windows, size of each sector is 512 bytes

Low Level Formatting

A high-level format is commonly done if a user wishes to erase the

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