User`s guide

At the bottom of the window, you can estimate how the resultant volume will look like after the

merging.

The results of the pending operation are immediately displayed as if the operation had been

performed.

To perform the pending operation you will have to commit it (p. 24). Exiting the program without

committing the pending operations will effectively cancel them.

Merging an NTFS volume to a volume with a file system that does not support security options (for example,

FAT32 volume), will result in the loss of security settings (volume ownership data and access permissions). With

the opposite action (merging a non-secured volume to a secured one), the main volume security settings will be

assigned to the resultant volume.

6.6 Formatting a volume

The formatting operation prepares a volume to store files and folders, by creating a file system on it.

Caution: Formatting destroys all data that is currently stored on the volume.

You may want to format a volume in the following cases:

 When you are creating the volume. In this case, the formatting window is part of the

Create Volume Wizard.

 When you want to quickly destroy data on the volume—for example, as a security best practice.

 When you want to change the volume’s file system to later store files more efficiently.

To format a volume

1. Right-click the volume that you want to format, and then click Format.

2. In File system, select the file system that you want to create on the volume. The NTFS file system

is recommended for most Windows operating systems.

Note: The FAT16 and FAT32 file systems can be created on a volume of up to 2 GB and up to 2 TB in size,

respectively.

For the list of supported file systems, see Supported file systems (p. 10).

3. In Cluster size, specify the cluster size—also known as allocation unit size—for the file system.

We recommend leaving the default size, which is marked in the list as (default).

For more information on choosing the cluster size, see “More about cluster sizes” later in this

section.

4. Optionally, in Volume label, type the volume label that you want to assign to the volume to

better differentiate it from other volumes.

The maximum number of characters in the volume label depends on the file system that you

selected—see Changing a volume label (p. 43).

5. Click OK to add the pending volume formatting operation.

The results of the pending operation are immediately displayed as if the operation had been

performed.

To perform the pending operation you will have to commit it (p. 24). Exiting the program without

committing the pending operations will effectively cancel them.