Formatting

[John Roberts]

The lady in the camera shop reminded me the other day to format an SD card that I had just bought off her. I have never formatted an SD card in my life and never thought I had to. Likewise, I made a copy of a video on to a DVD and lent it to a friend and when I saw him next he said that he'd had a bit of bother with it because it had needed formatting.

So, this formatting lark, what's that all about then?

 

[Deleted account 190920001]

SD cards generally come formated but its still good practise to do it yourself but not essential.

You burnt the DVD wrong if it said it needed formated in your mates computer or your mates computer is setup wrong. A properly burnt DVD cant be formated as it is fixed.

Formatting is just a means to erase all the disks contents and putting new file system tables on. Its generally quicker than deleting all the contents of a disk.

 

[John Roberts]

SD cards generally come formated but its still good practise to do it yourself but not essential.

You burnt the DVD wrong if it said it needed formated in your mates computer or your mates computer is setup wrong. A properly burnt DVD cant be formated as it is fixed.

Formatting is just a means to erase all the disks contents and putting new file system tables on. Its generally quicker than deleting all the contents of a disk.

Are you saying that a new card or disk shouldn't need formatting?

 

[Micky]

Shouldn't need formatting from new, but an SD card (or it's like) gets clogged up with useless bits and pieces over time, writing stuff to it, deleting, leaves behind a bit of a mess that you can't see, but over time reduces the capacity of the card and slows it down. Putting the card in your computer, or camera, and re formatting it, not only deletes what's on it but cleans it up .....

I think

 

[Deleted account 190920001]

A new card most likely not no, a new disk/hard drive will always need partitioning and formated though. A new disk/cd, dvd will be formated as part of the burning process if done properly. You can't reformat a cd, dvd once bunt 99% of the time as they are use once. There are rewritable disks avaliable though so some you can.

 

[(RIP) andrewgsadv]

If it's a card for a camera, format in camera keeps everything tickety boo. If its for computer format on computer .

 

[John Roberts]

If it's a card for a camera, format in camera keeps everything tickety boo. If its for computer format on computer.

By format in camera do you mean I should format it in the camera, and likewise by format on computer do you mean I should format it in the computer? How do I do that then?

OK- I'm sorry about this, I can be pretty thick at times I know.

PS Is it like cleaning up the hard drive?

 

[Mac]

If you put the card in your camera and work through the settings/ options menu there will ( or should ) be an option to 'Format SD Card'.

Select this and the camera will do it for you.

Also make sure the card is not locked - usually a small slide button on the side, it will not format if this in in the locked posistion.

 

[(RIP) andrewgsadv]

John format card in camera. As previous post.

Also delete photos after saving to computer, In camera.

If you delete photos off card whilst in computer often leaves info on card that makes it stop working in camera.

Hope that makes sense.

 

[John Roberts]

John format card in camera. As previous post.

Thanks for staying with me on this, I've just had a look in the camera's menu, Canon A720 IS, and can't see a format option.

 

[(RIP) andrewgsadv]

John type camera name into google and add how to format sd card, comes up with picture of screen you are looking for.
Hope that helps.
Andrew

 

[John Roberts]

Thank you, I owe you one!