Preparing a Hard Drive

Step 2 - Using FDISK

To start FDISK you will need to insert your DOS / Windows startup floppy disk, start your computer and when you get to the Command Prompt, type 'FDISK' then press <ENTER>.

You will be prompted to decide if you want to enable support for large drives (See below). What this means is - Do you want to use FAT32 on your drive? Since most of today's drives are well in excess of 2Gb(The maximum size of a FAT16 drive), you should always answer 'Yes' to this option, provided the drive you are going to partition is over 2Gb.

After you have made your selection, you will be presented with the main FDISK Options Screen.

Select one of the following options...

1. Create DOS Partition or Logical DOS Drive
2. Set Active Partition
3. Delete DOS Partition or Logical DOS Drive
4. Display partition information