Diskpart format Quick vs Normal

[jiewmeng]

is there any differences in diskpart when using the quick option and without? i guess definately cos quick is much faster but the question is whats the difference? does the "slow" format zero out the hdd or something?

[jaclaz]

is there any differences in diskpart when using the quick option and without? i guess definately cos quick is much faster but the question is whats the difference? does the "slow" format zero out the hdd or something?

Yes.

Here:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/941961/en-us

The behaviour changed in Vista and 7 has the same approach, AFAIK.

This was the "OLD" approach, up to XP and 2003:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/302686/en-us

jaclaz

[jiewmeng]

Yes.

Here:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/941961/en-us

The behaviour changed in Vista and 7 has the same approach, AFAIK.

so it does write zeros. is that a good thing? i rmb there was once i felt a performance boost by using DBAN to "nuke" or zero my hdd. but it will "stress" the hdd more right? but maybe it will still be ok, not too much damage done + performance boost

[jaclaz]

so it does write zeros. is that a good thing? i rmb there was once i felt a performance boost by using DBAN to "nuke" or zero my hdd. but it will "stress" the hdd more right? but maybe it will still be ok, not too much damage done + performance boost

No, a hard disk is made to be written onto, ALL THE TIME, writing once on each sector won't make any harm.

A single 00 pass is ALL that is needed.

The "utter stupidity" is doing more than a single pass, like the 7 passes DOD or the (completely misunderstood) Guttman's 35 passes:

http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=125900

There is actually NO need whatever, if not for making data UNrecoverable to 00 out a HD, the only parts that may be in a few particular cases be needed to be actually zeroed out are the MBR, hidden sectors and possibly the bootsector of first partition, not becuse there is an actual need to do it, but because a number of badly written utilities check anyway values in certain fields of them when re-partitioning/formatting.

00ing out a drive may as well be useful for use with some cloning/imaging utilities that may not consider a non-indexed-in-the-file-system sector as "blank" if not all made of 00's or F6's.

On the other hand, starting always with a completely 00ed out drive is a good idea as, in case of need of performing file-based data recovery there won't be "left-overs" and thus "false positives", in other words, it will be faster and much more easy/straightforward.

jaclaz

[jiewmeng]

A single 00 pass is ALL that is needed.

The "utter stupidity" is doing more than a single pass, like the 7 passes ...

00ing out a drive may as well be useful for use with some cloning/imaging utilities that may not consider a non-indexed-in-the-file-system sector as "blank" if not all made of 00's or F6's.

On the other hand, starting always with a completely 00ed out drive is a good idea as, in case of need of performing file-based data recovery there won't be "left-overs" and thus "false positives", in other words, it will be faster and much more easy/straightforward.

well explained thanks. i guess when i have time, once in a while if i were to want to clean install my windows, and before i make an image of windows, i will do a 00ing of hdd/free space