Format for Fat32

[Penney]

I'm trying to format an external HDD and get it going specifically for a PS3 to read as a Media drive, but as far as I can figure and have read it needs to be formatted specifically in FAT32. But as FAT32 is so old now I don't have any PC's that can do it specifically, I don't believe ex-fat will format it properly so I'm looking for a good program to format it with, for free of course.

If anyone knows what I'm trying to do and has done it, love to hear what you have to say, and if anyone knows of a good formatting utility. Any help is appreciated

[MNM]

Connect it to you PC(with Windows), right-click, format...?

[Penney]

With newer computers with XP, Vista, and 7, the only Fat option you have is exfat, and I don't think exfat is exactly the same thing. I work with several different computers and this is what I've found anyways. I know that there are program out there, i just thought someone would already have been familier with one.

[MNM]

Windows disc's repair mode?

[Dionysos]

In the olden days I used Partition Magic... should still be around.

You could also just use an Ubuntu Live cd and use the partition editor there I also find it highly unlikely that windows doesn't have a fat32 formater.

[xoqolatl]

On Vista and 7 (may also work on Xp but I didn't check):
Start -> run... -> diskmgmt.msc -> you should see something like this:

Right click on the partition you want formatted and select "Format...", confirm to delete data and you should be able to select FAT32. If not, delete all volumes on target disk and try to create a new FAT32 partition.

Also, if this method fails, there is a more hardcore and closer to the metal way: using diskpart.
1. Run cmd as admin
2. "diskpart", enter
3. List disks by issuing "list disk" command and remember the number of the disk you want formatted
4. "select disk X" where X = the number
5. "clean"
6. "create partition primary"
7. "select partition 1"
8. "format fs=FAT32"
9. "assign" - optional, assigns a mount point so it will be accesible via windows explorer

[Penney]

I ended up doing it via a CMD line, this site told me all and gave me a simple .exe to run threw the cmd.

http://www.ridgecrop.demon.co.uk/index. ... format.htm

heres the link, but i guess disk manager would have worked had I known it specifically gave Fat32, it just didn't give me the option threw reguler format, simply NTFS and exFat