Q: Formatting disk takes hours?
What is the average time to format a Seagate 1TB disk in the Mac OS Extended (Journaled) mode? A few hours ago Linc recommended that I back up my system and upgrade from Yosemite to El Capitan due to panic log information, with the "hope that this will fix a possible OS X bug, or else a hardware fault in the wireless module, the logic board, or the startup drive." The Seagate drive I bought yesterday says it will take up to 4hrs to "Erase free space" and that number keeps climbing. Prior to the formatting I performed a disk verify/repair on it (it needed repairing). And what should I do if my computer crashes while it is formatting?
Thank you — Kim
Posted on Mar 17, 2016 12:46 PM
Did Linc tell you to erase free space? Because simply erasing the hard drive should be done relatively quickly but erasing free space can take a long time to complete. I'm not sure what the average time is but considering you have a 1 TB hard drive, I am not completely surprised that it is taking 4+ hours.
While erasing free space is more secure, it is not really required unless you are deleting documents that are a matter of national security. A regular erase will suffice unless you are paranoid about your documents being recovered. (The only other time it may be required is if you are unable to erase your hard drive using a normal erase, or if your hard drive is failing and needs to be reformatted. Sometimes a secure erase will work when a normal erase doesn't)
Also, there are a few options for "Erase free space," one of which takes a very long time. See Apple's article about erasing free space. Linc Davis is a very knowledgable person around this support site, so if he told you to do something I'm sure it was the right thing to do.
Posted on Mar 17, 2016 1:20 PM