[tomra]

Hi.

What does the "low level" and "zero all data" initializing options do?
When are they supposed to be used?

Thanks.
Tom

[iNub]

Initializing a drive just wipes it of directory information. That is why it takes about 3 seconds to initialize even the slowest of drives.

Low-level formatting erases every file on the drive. It's useful in the case of a soft-damaged cluster or something along those lines. Unfortunately, it's only an option on SCSI drives. This can take upwards of 2 hours on large drives.

Zero all data does exactly that: Every bit of information on the drive is written over with a zero. It's also available on every kind of drive. It also takes a long time, since it's erasing every bit of information on the disk.

[tomra]

Hi, iNub.

Thanks for your info.
I initializined a disc a couple of days ago and and checked the option to zero all data because...well, it sounded like a good thing to do. However, it did not change the name of the previous partion which got me a bit surprised. Is this info stored in RAM or something like that?

Thanks.
Tom