Re: SCSI Sector Size Problem
Robert Sheehy (rsheehy@ac4.jjc.cc.il.us)
Thu, 31 Oct 1996 17:27:29 -0600
> I was just reading about low level formatting in a book on PC Hardware
> Upgrade and Repair. At least some modern drives have lost the ability to
> do low level formatting reliably. There is a cost associated with having
> precise enough writing mechanism to do the low level format and some
> manufactures reduce cost by skipping that step... just allowing the low
> level format commands but not actually doing anything. Other manufactures
> have cheap write mechanisms which can write to known places but not
> provide the precise placement needed for an actual low level format.
>
> The bottom line was that on modern drives a low level format might 1) do
> nothing or 2) damage the drive so seriously a factory reformat would be
> needed.
That's for IDE drives, thats why they are so inexpensive compared to
SCSI drives. SCSI drives you can low-level format, but IDE's you can't.
Golden rule of IDE's, never low-level format them.