Formatting usb flash drive program. Programs for repairing USB flash drives, SD cards (diagnostics and testing, formatting, recovery)

Flash drives are a very popular storage accessory. important information or to transfer data between several computers when it is not possible to transfer them in other ways. Despite the high reliability and the possibility of repeated recording, under the influence of various factors, wear of microcircuits and memory sections occurs, as a result of which various failures and malfunctions can occur, and information can be read and written with errors. As a result, the system may require you to format the flash drive and not open it. You can try to check the disk for errors or restore the data and continue using it.

The last resort for restoring the functionality of a flash drive is low-level formatting.

But when everything is so bad that neither recovery nor regular formatting helps, only low-level formatting will help. It will help to fully restore the functionality of the flash drive, as well as get rid of errors and failures. In this article, we will take a closer look at what low-level formatting of a flash drive is, as well as software that can help with this.

It’s worth starting with how the file system is organized. The entire file system is divided into tracks and sectors (so-called clusters) of a certain size, which, in turn, are combined into sections or directories. Depending on the file system used, their organization and location may vary. All service information is recorded in the memory of the controller, which manages requests for access to to the right place in memory. When you transfer data to storage media, the file is split into cluster-sized pieces and written to a specific sector of the disk. When reading, the controller accesses the desired sector, and you gain access to the data.

If for some reason the location of the sectors is lost, for example, when writing or reading a large amount of data, you pulled the flash drive out of the connector, the controller cannot correctly access the desired sector, since that section is damaged. Low-level formatting allows you to delete memory sectors located on the disk and clear control information controller. In other words, you do full reset firmware of a flash drive or memory card and erase the file system. To continue using the flash drive, you will need to format it in the usual way.

What else is low-level formatting used for?

• Complete cleaning of various malicious files found on a flash drive, especially if they cannot be removed in the usual way using an antivirus or recovery.
• The most reliable and complete removal of secret and important data to eliminate the possibility of restoring them using special software.
• Prevention of errors in the presence of bad sectors and junk files that interfere with normal functioning.
• To restore the boot sector, that is, if the flash drive is physically intact, but the system cannot access the files.

In order to perform this procedure, you will need special software. Let's look at some best utilities that can help you with this. Usually they all support all major drive models, but since some of them may have their own characteristics, in such cases you will have to limit yourself to a utility tailored for use with devices from a specific manufacturer.

Review of the best utilities

A very powerful and advanced utility for low-level formatting of flash drives and other storage media. The program is capable of resuscitating them from almost any, even the most hopeless, state (well, except perhaps for unrecoverable physical damage to microcircuits and controllers), as well as completely erasing absolutely any information without the possibility of recovery. The program erases the disk partition table without leaving a trace, and then re-partitions it.

Program features:

• Full support for almost any model of flash drive or disk from popular manufacturers.
• Compatible with all possible connection interfaces.
• Detailed report on the work done.
• Limited Features free version and no restrictions in paid.

How to use the utility correctly?

1. Download installation file from the site, launch it.
2. When you launch it for the first time, click the Continue for free button.
3. Find your flash drive in the list of displayed media and double-click on its name with the mouse.
4. Select from the list of possible operations Low- Level Format- Format This Device - Yes.
5. After the procedure is completed, open Windows Explorer, right-click on the flash drive and select “Format.”
6. After this, you can use your flash drive.

An excellent utility for performing low-level formatting with Russian-language interface And minimum requirements to computer resources. The program does not even need installation, as it works in portable mode. How to use it?

1. Download and run the program installation file.
2. In the main window, place the cursor on the disk that you want to format, click the “Recover media” button.
3. Wait for the process to complete, click the “Finish” button.
4. Format the media as usual using Windows Explorer.

The utility is designed for use with JetFlash, Transcend, A-Data media. Maybe you'll be lucky and be able to recover another flash drive. What are the features of the application?

• Complete portability.
• The minimum number of buttons is only two - “Start” and “Exit”.
• Work in the cloud, so the load on the computer is minimal.

You need to download the installation file, run it and click the “Start” button. Very simple and fast.

SP USB Flash Drive Recovery Software

A proprietary utility from a well-known manufacturer of portable Silicon drives Power. However, even if your flash drive from another manufacturer uses standard device identifiers, you can safely use it. To do this you need:

1. Download the installation file and run it.
2. Select your flash drive from the list.
3. Click the start recovery button.

In a couple of seconds everything will work as expected.

Since Kingston has a significant share of the portable media market, it also offers its customers a utility for restoring USB drives. It is also not overloaded with functions, has the most necessary functions and practically does not load the system. To format a flash drive using this utility, you need:

1. Download it and save it in a folder on your hard drive.
2. Open the archive, click the Unzip button in the automatic unpacker that opens and select the folder where you want to save the unzipped files.
3. Go to the folder where you unpacked the utility and run the program file.
4. Select your flash drive from the list of drives and folders and click Format.
5. Wait until the program finishes its work to start using your flash drive.

A universal application for formatting flash drives from different manufacturers. It is completely free and is very effective in the fight against damaged partitions and sectors. In addition to formatting, the program is equipped with the following functions:

• Supports almost all existing manufacturers and models.
• Work on all the most modern versions operating system Windows.
• Checking and correcting errors.
• Quick formatting.
• Deep and traceless deletion of all recorded data.
• A detailed log of work operations.

To use the program:

1. Download the program and run it.
2. Select the flash drive and file system format from the list.
3. Come up with a name for the disc.
4. Click Format disk.
5. Wait until the procedure is completed.

Conclusion

Carry out low-level formatting, despite the abundance software, should be used with caution as there is a risk of irreversible damage. Then you'll have to go and buy a new media. In the comments, please write what program you used to format your USB drive.

If the flash drive takes a long time to load, reset or open files, this is a clear sign that its sectors and tracks are damaged. This problem can be solved quite simply - low-level formatting of the flash drive is carried out.

This formatting provides for new markings into sectors and tracks with recording of service information for the operation of the device. Operating principle: deleting all files that were or are on the media, the sector values ​​become “zero”, and as a result, the data cannot be recovered in the future, which is very important if you need to avoid leakage confidential information when transferring the device to other people.

Why is the flash drive buggy and how can low-level formatting fix it?

The fact is that when recording files via a computer or any other device, recording can be done on bad sectors. As a rule, modern flash drives allow this, but older manufacturers do not.

How does this work?

Marks damaged sectors, blocks them and optimizes the operation of the flash drive. It is worth noting that full formatting cannot be done at home - this must happen at the manufacturer. But the low-level flash drive formatting utility simulates this process, which is quite enough if you need to block sectors and delete information free of charge for its confidentiality.

Low-level formatting of a flash drive: program, suitable for this process

The simplest and most common solution is to use the HDD Low Level Format program. First you need to download it. After downloading, install in free mode(on offer to purchase paid version you can safely refuse), the only difference is that there will be no updates. For those who do not know English, we clarify: you need to click “Continue for free” (from English “Continue for free”).

After installation, a list will be displayed with all flash drive models supported by the program. You can select the one you need by setting the parameters in the “Capacity” and “Model” columns. Having selected the required model and volume, click on the “Continue” button. How to determine the model is below in the material.

A new window will display information on the selected storage device. From all options, select “Device details”, the general and detailed information on a flash drive, and among these parameters you need to select the tab: “Low-level format” (Low-level formatting of a flash drive). The formatting process will begin, and the main screen of the program will display all the processes that the HDD program Low Level Format, and the percentage of formatting completed.

Remarque

For high-level formatting, you need to select “Perform quick wipe” (check the box there). After selecting an action, a window will appear indicating that all data will be deleted without the possibility of recovery. You need to click “OK”.

After formatting the flash drive begins, the screen will show the percentage of sectors completed; at this time, you should not try to open the flash drive, write or read files from it, and you should not remove the device from the slot. At the end of the operation, the installation bar will turn yellow: low-level formatting of the flash drive is completed. Now you need to format high level- this will write the file table, otherwise the flash drive will not work.

How to determine your device model

In order for the program to format the drive, you need to specify its size and model. The computer itself can indicate the volume, but the situation with determining the model is somewhat more complicated. In this case, the user can only be helped special utility.

A popular program is ChipGenius. It does not require installation, just download it and open it, but before that you need to insert the device into the USB port. In the program window you should select the required drive. The utility will provide a lot unnecessary information, so you need to skip everything and pay attention to two fields:

Controller Part-Number - device model;
. Flash ID code - will show the memory capacity of the flash drive, the type and model of flash memory.
That's all, if you know these parameters, low-level formatting of a flash drive is not a problem.

The standard method did not help: other ways to format a flash drive

Having carried out all the above procedures and come to a dead end, do not get upset. Sometimes a device needs a special utility from the manufacturer or simply created for it. For example, low-level Kingston can be done only after high-level through the HP USB Disk Storage Format Tool. In the Device field, select the desired drive, then click the “Start” button at the bottom of the field. Carry out the formatting discussed at the beginning of the material.

Remark: do not forget to repeat high level formatting at the very end, otherwise the device will not work.

This method can also produce low-level Transcend or any other if the first method did not help.

Special use of low-level formatting: multiple partitions on one flash drive

Firstly, why is this necessary?

1. Availability of several operating systems on one drive.
2. Actions and manipulations with one section do not affect the other.
3. You can create several independent file systems.
4. Based on point “3”, fragmentation can be carried out within only one partition, thereby reducing time consumption, because a file can only be located in one file system, and it is easier for the program to “sort everything out”.
5. Regardless of the type of file systems, information can be stored in partitions with different clusters. It is very convenient, for example, to store large video files separately from small ones. accordingly, there will be more and less - this allows you to read files, upload and download them faster.

Which program should I choose?

BOOTICE- universal utility, which can both perform low-level formatting of a flash drive, and split it into several sections, as well as manipulate them.

So, for example, we split the Kingston flash drive into 7.5 GB. Divide into two sections with a file system ( File System) FAT 32 with Vol Label (1st: BOOT, 2nd: DATA) and a capacity of 4000 and 3500 MB, respectively.

1. Open the program.
2. Find the line “Destination Disk” and select the desired drive in it.
3. Click the Parts Manage window.
4. An empty tab will appear, and at the bottom there will be a “Parts Manage” button - select and click.
5. Select “ReFormat USB disk”.
6. In the window that appears, select USB-HDD Mode (Multi Partitions) and below indicate Align to 1 MB.
7. Click Next and in a new window set the previously mentioned data: Size: 4000 and 3500, FileSystem: FAT 32 for both, Vol Label: BOOT and DATA.
8. Press “Okey” and wait for the procedure to complete.

Kingston Technology

In conclusion, let’s say a few words about one of the industry leaders, Kingston Technology. We are talking about an American private international corporation that develops, supports, sells and produces flash memory, as well as other computer devices, which are associated with memory. The company's headquarters are located in California, USA. Interestingly, Kingston employs over 4,700 people worldwide. The company has manufacturing facilities and offices in the United States, China, Taiwan, Ireland and the United Kingdom.

Currently, it is the Kingston company that has managed to become the second largest supplier of flash memory, as well as the first distributor of USB drives and the third distributor of flash cards. Kingston Technology Corporation is one of the leading memory developers in the world, so if it weren’t for this digging, we might not have asked the question posed at the beginning of the article. What is the manufacturer of the flash drive you decided to format?

SD Card Formatter - free desktop program for formatting SD/SDHC/SDXC cards. It is an indispensable tool for restoring compatibility of SD and microSD memory cards with operating systems and devices. Correct formatting does not always, but in many cases eliminates the problem of file system incompatibility.

The SD Formatter application is designed entirely for working with memory cards, formatting them using SD/SDHC/SDXC standards. Therefore, if for certain reasons your SD card cannot be formatted, we strongly recommend SD Formatter as a formatting tool instead of the standard utilities included with the operating system. Those applications also work with almost all types of flash drives and cards, but the result is not optimal in performance. Manufacturers advise formatting the SD card using special applications. SDFormatter is one of the best for formatting.

How to format an Android device

In fact, formatting the memory of a tablet or phone running Android is not difficult.

To format the memory card, you need to go to Settings - Privacy - Reset settings. However, in latest versions Android this method is not available, so we would advise formatting the memory card on a computer. How to do this - read below.

How to format a phone tablet using a card reader

To format your tablet or phone you will need a card reader and installed program sdformatter, which can be downloaded from the link above.

1. Remove the microsd/sd card from the android device
2. We take a card reader, connect it to the computer and insert a memory card into it
3. Launch the sdformatter program
4. In the list of disks in the sdformatter window, indicate the letter of the memory card connected through the card reader (you can check the match by the disk label or by the contents of the memory card). Be careful, make sure that you are going to format the exact memory card that was in the phone!
5. Go to the settings of the sdformatter program (Option button) and select the formatting type Full OverWrite.
6. Click Format and wait for formatting to finish.
7. We take out the SD card from the card reader and insert it into the phone.

How to format a memory card on your phone using SD Format

You can read about how to work with SD Formatter in official instructions or follow the instructions in the program's Message Area. The utility is very simple in design, and we note key features when working with her.

Download SD Card Formatter

The first thing you need for successful formatting is to download the SD Memory Card Formatter application.

Important. Administrator rights are required to run SD Card Formatter.

Connecting a memory card to a computer

Carefully remove the memory card from mobile phone(or tablet) and connect it to the PC using a card reader. Alternatively, you can simply connect the device to your computer on which the SD Memory Card Formatter program is installed.

To work with media, you will need one of the special devices:

• USB SD Card reader - separate device, connected respectively via the computer’s USB port
• SD Card slot - usually available in any laptop/Macbook.

Formatting Settings

Formatting is configured through the Option window. Format Options provides two types of formatting:

• Quick format - files and folders are marked as writable, but formatting does not affect the data in the files
• Full (Overwrite) format - the program deletes the contents of files.

In other words, after Quick format you can still try to recover files, while after Overwrite format the chances are extremely small.

Selecting a drive to format

From the Drive list you need to select the SD card to format. As a rule, the program does this on its own. Conveniently, hard drive partitions are not displayed here, so it’s difficult to get confused and select the wrong drive. However, it is still worth double-checking the name of the letter if other storage media are connected to the computer.

If the flash drive was inserted into the SD slot after the program was launched, the disk may not appear immediately. In this case, you need to click the Refresh Button and check the status field. The blue logo in the main window indicates that the SD card has been successfully connected.

A similar scenario also applies if you don’t know how to format an Android phone: follow the instructions carefully, SD Format is quite suitable for working with this mobile OS.

Perform formatting

To apply the settings, you must click OK; to start formatting, click Format in the main program window.

When formatting is complete, a window with the status Memory Card Format Complete! Information about the file system, available memory card capacity, and cluster size is also available here.

Instructions on how to format an SD card

Resume. SD Formatter - great program for formatting microsd, sd and other memory cards. If you don't know how to format an SD card standard means or encountered certain problems reading information from a memory card, this utility will provide all possible assistance. The program is absolutely free and safe, and you should not be afraid that after formatting you will receive a “brick” at your disposal.

Supported SD memory card interfaces

The sdformatter utility supports multiple device interfaces for working with SD, SDHC, microsd and SDXC

• SD slot on computer
• SD reader by USB protocol
• PC card, CardBus or ExpressCard SD adapter

Before downloading sdformatter and immediately before starting to work with the application, you need to make sure that you have the ability to work with an SD card using one of the above protocols with the sdformatter program.

SDFormatter application interface

1 Status

This field shows the status of the SD memory card/SDHC/SDXC memory and the device interface.

• Blue: activity status.
• No logo: SD memory card or SDHC/SDXC memory card or SD interface of the device is disabled.
• Grey: no connection. These can be SD memory cards, SDHC/SDXC cards recognized by the SD Formatter utility.

2 Drive

This list indicates the SD/memory card drives, SDHC/SDXC cards that have been opened and recognized in the SD Formatter. A drive from this list can be selected to format the SD memory card.

3 Size of SD card

This field indicates the capacity of SD/SDHC/SDXC cards on the selected drive.

4 Message Area

This area displays SD Formatter messages or notifications to users. This area is useful for additional information in case sd card not formatted.

5 Refresh Button

This button is used to update the information on the SD memory card/memory card or SDHC/SDXC storage cards. When you press this button, the SD Formatter receives the latest information from the SD memory of the storage card. This button is useful when new memory cards, SD/SDHC memory/SDXC cards are added via the device's SD interface.

6 Volume Label

This field in the sdformatter program is used to display the sd volume label. Enter the new volume label that will be written to the SD card during formatting. You can enter up to 11 characters in the Volume Label field. If NOT was used in the volume label name English language, this field may not display correctly. In this case, you should enter the new SD card volume label in English.

7 Option button

This sdformatter utility button is used to select options when performing a format operation. When the button is pressed, a window with options for formatting the SD card is displayed on the screen.

8 SD card formatting options

This area shows the current SD card format options selected in the format window options. If the SD card is not formatted, you should vary the program options.

9 Button to start formatting SD (Format)

This button starts formatting the SD memory card. After clicking this button, a confirmation window for the formatting operation will appear on the screen. You can continue or cancel formatting the disk/sd card.

10 Exit button

This button is used to exit the SD Formatter application after formatting the memory card

It should be noted that memory cards supporting SD/SDHC/SDXC protocols have a so-called protected area intended for standard features security. The SD Formatter 4.0 utility does not format this security zone. Therefore, always use the corresponding application or SD-compatible device to provide SD-protected function to format the protected area on the memory card.

System requirements to run sdformatter

This information will be useful if your memory card cannot be formatted and there is a need to install the sdformatter application.

If an SDxc card is connected directly through the computer's SD slot without installing a driver, the card may not be recognized correctly, and therefore a message will appear indicating that it needs to be formatted. In this case, do not agree to format the memory card: this may lead to complete removal data on the storage device and unwanted formatting in a file system that is not compatible with the SDXC device.

SD Card Formatter vs standard formatting tools

Basic tools are available for Windows and Mac OS. hard formatting disk, USB drive and SD card. But this method is not recommended: formatting may significantly reduce the performance of the storage device.

SD Card Formatter has no such drawback. Moreover, the program is often used to fix problems with memory card recognition after incorrect standard Windows formatting.

Unlike system utilities, SD Formatter does not affect the protected area. This reserved area on the memory card is required for security functions. It is not recommended to format it.

As the developers of SD Formatter clarify, formatting is configured for maximum performance(for file FAT systems). This way, you can use the default settings when formatting.

Like other programs, SD Formatter cannot format encrypted memory cards (for example, BitLocker To Go). Therefore, a mandatory step is to decrypt the content before performing the operation.

Answers to readers' questions

How to format a flash drive on Android?

Answer. To format a memory card of a device on the Android platform, you need to remove the card from your phone or tablet, then use a card reader to connect it to your computer. After that, open SD Formatter and find the flash drive in the list of storage devices. All subsequent steps are described in the instructions for formatting a memory card above.

The operating system displays the following error: "Windows cannot complete formatting." What would this mean, how to solve the problem?

Answer. Usually this error appears in two cases: if for certain reasons the formatting cannot be completed or the flash drive cannot be formatted regular means OS.

There are two methods for solving formatting errors and, accordingly, two tools. The first one is built-in system utility diskmgmt.msc (run via Start - Run). The second program, as you may have guessed, is sd formatter. Through it you can perform quick and deep (low-level) microsd formatting cards.

What is low-level formatting microsd?

Answer. - this is a type of formatting of a memory card and flash drive, which involves cleaning and subsequent testing, creating a table of files and copying it to the service partition of the storage device. As a rule, you should resort to low-level formatting only in extreme cases, if the microsd or sd card is working with errors.

I recently bought a 16 GB memory card. The phone supports more, but there was a problem when using the phone for a long time for an hour or two. Applications on the memory card open and close immediately, but when the phone is rebooted, everything goes back to normal, and then goes bad again. Why is this so?

Answer. It is not a fact that the problem is related to the memory card. If specific application causes a conflict, this may affect the operation of other programs. It may be running in the background.

Check if your phone has unnecessary applications. Removing them may correct the situation.

If the method of deleting applications does not work, try formatting the card microsd memory. This can be done either through your phone (in the Android settings) or through a card reader on your computer. SD Formatter is precisely this program for formatting a memory card.

Problem with flash drive. 2 days ago I bought a new 16 gig flash card. I inserted it onto Android and formatted it completely and then moved the files from Android to it. After formatting the sd card everything is fine, but when I download some videos and applications from the Internet after 5 minutes, they get damaged. More precisely, he writes: it is impossible to play the video and the black screen. The application says: package parsing error. I formatted the microsd again - everything seems to be clean. And again the files are damaged. last night at android folder I saw strange files with an unknown format in the SD card, 2-3 gig in size. I tried to delete it, but it says the deletion failed. I rebooted Android and they disappeared. Could it be a virus or something else?

Answer. An error in parsing a package in Android occurs, as a rule, due to the incorrect size of the apk file. This means that the installer was copied to microsd card not completely.

Perhaps during formatting it was specified wrong format. Android supports FAT and exFAT, try this one or this one. Read above for information on how to format microsd using SDFormatter.

If the problem cannot be resolved, remove unnecessary ones and recently installed applications on your phone, as a last resort, update the Android firmware.

The phone sees the flash drive, reads the photos that were on the flash card, but does not open applications on the flash drive. Samsung phone galaxy s3 mini.

Answer. If you can't open apps on your phone, you can move them to internal memory phone using the application manager. The second option is to download them again from Google Play and install it on the memory card.

If the application still does not open, format the memory card to FAT or exFAT.

I was watching a video on my Nomi_i4510 phone and suddenly I forgot about the charge percentage and the phone turned off. I put it on charge, turned it on, and in the notifications it says “there is no SD card, if you can’t connect the SD card, click forget device.” I reboot the phone and go into settings, then into storage and storage and there’s this picture: internal storage SD card (damaged) and below – SD card is missing. I go to the SD card and it says that in order to continue using the SD card you need to format it. I click “Format” and now it’s formatted, everything is ok. But the fact is that the SD card partition (missing) is still there and rebooting does not help. That is, the SD card is connected and works normally and it’s as if it’s missing. What to do, how to format the SD card?

Answer. Try formatting the SD card not through your phone, but using the sd formatter program. Also try inserting another memory card into your phone and see if information about the missing card appears. If yes, update the phone firmware and reboot the device. As a last resort, you will have to do . Whether the game is worth the candle is up to you to decide (save everything first important files from phone to computer).

I bought it 2 months ago HUAWEI phone LUA - 21. It reads the memory card, but when I take a photo or download a program from the Internet, they always write: “no memory,” although I have a new micro flash drive. And every time the “Preparing SD card” notification appears.

Answer. Errors may occur due to incorrect formatting of the memory card. This is a fairly common problem and is easy to fix:

1. remove the sd card from the phone,
2. connect to PC (via card reader)
3. copy the files from the flash drive to the PC (do backup copy)
4. format the memory card to Fat32 or exFAT
5. copy files from PC back to USB flash drive

After these steps, the SD card should be normally detected by the phone.

Please tell me, is it possible to decrypt an SD card using this program? Because there was a failure in the phone, and the files remained encrypted and the phone does not read them.

Answer. Unfortunately, it will not be possible to return encrypted data after resetting the settings. Neither additional software like SD Formatter nor the built-in capabilities of Android will help. For further use, you need to format the SD card. It is clear that you will lose the encrypted data on the microSD.

I formatted the phone. Now it asks for the account that was synced with it. I don't know this account because I turned off synchronization. What to do?

Answer. Probably we are talking about Google account, which is indicated in the Android settings or immediately at the stage initial setup phone. Create new account in Google and connect a new email.

Lenovo A7000 phone. Reads microsd as internal memory. There's a lot on the map free space, but it doesn’t even allow applications to update. I deleted a bunch of applications, left only the most necessary ones - I still can’t download anything. How to make a memory card external media? Only resell?

Answer. Most likely, the problem is due to incorrect formatting of the card. Try formatting the SD card on your computer, selecting Fat or extFat as the file system on the microsd. The SDFormatter utility will handle this task.

HDD Low Level Format Tool – convenient small program to format the hard drive, as well as any storage devices connected to the computer. It supports work with any interfaces, including USB, SATA, SCSI, IDE, Firewire. Works with devices from such manufacturers as Samsung, Fujitsu, Maxtor, Seagate, IBM, Toshiba, Quantum. It can also work with flash cards if the computer supports a card reader.

This utility destroys all data recorded on the media, including boot sectors with logical partitions. Using low-level programming, this program deletes data in such a way that it is not possible to recover it later. Keep this in mind before you begin.

The program is provided on the Internet for free use. After downloading the program distribution and launching it, you will see the following window in front of you.

Installing the program is extremely simple. So we won’t dwell on it.

After installation, you will be asked to read the license agreement, and will also be informed that you can use the program for free as much as you like, however, by paying only $3.30, you can use the program with better speed and receive constant updates. We chose the free option. In the future, this window will appear every time the application is launched.

This hard drive formatting program has a very simple interface. After launch, this window will appear in front of you.

At the top is the name and version of the program, and also indicates that we are using free option. On the right is active link to the developers website.

The main part of the window is occupied by a list of storage devices that are at the moment connected to your computer and available for work. Various information about the devices is indicated here, including the type of interface through which the connection was made, model, serial number and memory capacity.

To test the program, we, of course, will not use our own hard drive. Therefore, we will conduct the experiment on a 4 GB flash drive. Having selected this device (it is the second one on our list), click the “Continue >>>” button

This is what we see next.

The current date and time are indicated here, again the name and version of the program, and the device connected when USB help 2.0 and its memory capacity. Next, data about the device should be indicated, but in our case it is not available.

The next tab contains the event log and displays the formatting process. Here is the button to start and stop formatting. You can also check the box and select the quick option.

On the third tab you can get S.M.A.R.T. information about the device.

Before starting formatting, the program asks if you really want to start this process.

After launch, the window displays the formatting process.

The speed does not rise above 4.3 Mb/sec. This is the peculiarity of the free version. The paid one, obviously, has no speed limits. The process as a whole happens quite quickly, so there are no complaints here. Within about 10 minutes, the formatting of the flash drive was completed. Note also that when working with hard drives, the speed will definitely be higher.

Thus, this program will help not only format any disk drive, but also restore the operation of a flash drive or flash card if it is not detected by your computer.

Various flash drives and memory cards are very well established in our lives. Today they attract attention with their low cost and large memory capacity. But, as it turned out, many manufacturers have not yet found a way to produce successful models of flash drives and memory cards. Unfortunately, they also produce unsuccessful ones. What's the matter? The fact is that one of the problems when formatting is often an error - Windows can't complete disk formatting. The recording may differ on different OSes, but it does not change the essence. Now let’s figure out why the flash drive is not formatted and analyze it all sorts of ways solutions.

Standard formatting procedures if the flash drive is not formatted

If you were unable to format the flash drive in any way, then there are two options: either take the device to a service center or throw it in the trash.But trying is not torture; we have several more ways to fix our problem.

So, the first thing we will do is try to format the flash drive via the console. We have already done a similar procedure in the article, but this time we will use a different command.

If the files on the flash drive were occupied by some process, then “formatting” in the usual way - through my computer - would not have worked, since Windows will not allow such files to be destroyed. Through the console we will clear everything completely.

Using the Win+R key combination, enter the command in the window that opens:

The Disk Management Manager will open. Look for your flash drive, right-click on it and select format.

If everything worked out, you can close this article. If not, then read on, there are a couple more ways.

Methods for SD cards and flash drives

The flash drive cannot be formatted using standard options? Then let's move on to using the program USB Disk Storage Format Tool. The program is free and can be safely downloaded, and how to use it is written in.

Now about MicroSD. If, when formatting memory card data, you also experience similar error, you can try using the SDFormatter utility. Here is the link: https://www.sdcard.org/downloads/formatter_4/

Launch it and in the window that opens, select our flash drive (where Drive). Press Option and where Format Type set Full(Erase), and where Format Size Adjustment we set On. And click Format.

Update dated July 24, 2016 . This program— SDFormatter may not work, so we move on to other methods. Found interesting program called USB Flash Drive Repair Tool. This utility is capable of low-level formatting and disabling write protection on a flash drive, let’s try it. Here is the download link. If any method helped, please write in the comments.

But they are described here, I advise you to look.

Team Diskpart

Launch the command line. By pressing the Win+X key combinations, select "Command line". In the window that opens, write:

It shows all drives that are connected to the computer, including flash drives and memory cards.

We find the flash drive (it’s usually at the very bottom) and enter the following command to select the flash drive:

To view the disk attributes, you need to enter this command:

Exit the utility using the command exit and try to format the flash drive or SD drive again.

And finally, if the flash drive cannot be formatted, there is another way.

Formatting with Flashnul

Download the special utility flashnul. This is a utility for testing removable drives and you need to work with it very carefully, otherwise you may damage data on other drives. Here is the link (you need to copy and paste into address bar: http://shounen.ru/soft/flashnul/index.html)

We unpack the program onto some disk, for example, D. Then the path will be like this: D:\flashnul.

Now, using the same Win+X key combinations, we launch our command line, where we enter the following command:

cd D:\\flashnul

Once we are in the directory with the utility folder, we need to identify the flash drive.

We write the following: flashnul –p

In the list that appears, find the number of your flash drive and remember it. You can remember the letter, it doesn’t matter.

Let's say that your flash drive has the letter M, then you need to write a command that will erase all data to zero:

flashnul M: –F

Now let’s run a test for controller errors, which will also destroy data:

flashnul M: –l

At the end of the test, run formatting again using management console. And the error should no longer appear.

I hope this article fully helped you get rid of the problem of formatting flash drives and memory cards.

I noticed that users are having problems with the Flashnul utility. It consists of an error that flashnul is not an internal or external command. The solution here is simple. First, open the command line and go to the directory where you unpacked the flashnul program, for me it’s drive E. In the line we simply write "E:".

Now go to the flashnul directory, to do this you need to enter "cd flashnul".

After this, you can enter all the other commands described above. Good luck to you. I am attaching a screenshot of the actions.

Can't format a flash drive even using the methods indicated by yours? You can try using the Usbflashinfo program. After launching the program, click on “get information about the flash drive”. Need to find the lines VID And PID. You copy and paste the values ​​that are indicated in them into a search engine. It is possible that there is a special utility for this memory controller that can be used to perform the formatting procedure. Here is the download link: http://www.antspec.com/usbflashinfo/

You can also use the website flashboot.ru. There are many different programs for flash drives and memory cards from well-known manufacturers.

It happens that no matter how hard you try, but the result is zero, then you just have to throw out the flash drive and buy a new one, hoping that it won’t fail too much for a long time. If you purchased it recently, then return it under warranty, since you may have a defect. Now you basically know what to do if the flash drive cannot be formatted.