I need to format a compact-flash card to FAT. Most, if not all, of our PCs here are running Windows XP. Is there a third-party app to do this? I have UBUNTU at home but I'm a noob with it. How about using that?

Thanks for any help.

Shawn

Format X:/FS:FAT where X is the drive letter of your flash drive.

format /? from a command prompt will give you all the options.

Sam

FAT (16 bits implied) or FAT32? Are you trying to recover lost data? Are you having trouble mouting the flash drive?

If you just want to blow it away and start from scratch, then by all means format. From an UBUNTU prompt, type man mkfs. This is equivalent to the DOS /? switch. Use mkfs.msdos for FAT16 or mkfs.vfat for FAT32.

Your flash drive--thumb or compact--usually appears as device /dev/sdb or /dev/sdb1. If you're using a GUI (like I do with my Knoppix machine), the icon will look different than the fixed drives and will be labeled "sdb1" or similar.

This will help if you're having trouble sleeping.

I need it in FAT16 for the old voicemails. I'll take a look at the document. Thank You.

Shawn -


The document dagwoodsystems listed is EXCELLENT. Yes you can format in Ubuntu, but if you're working on a windows machine.....

Again.

On Windows XP. Start-->Programs-->Accessories--> Command Prompt.

Format x:/fs:fat will format your drive to fat 16

Format /? will give you all your options. Make sure you're using the proper drive letter.

Sam

I just right clicked on a thumb drive in "my computer" and one of the options was format, and that gave me FAT or FAT32
(XP Pro).
I do have the HP utility to make them bootable. It is all over the net tho.