Formatting USB1TB with the Fat32 tool, the tool says it's completed formatting, but hte drive is not formatted under Windows 7 (which also can't format the drive).

Try formatting to FAT32.

MACs does not recognise windows NTFS format. So backup the data (if exist) and format drive to FAT32 or ExFAT.

I experienced the same problem (my USB device ). try these steps:
1. Start, Control Panel,
2. Performance and Maintenance,
3. Administrative Tools,
4. Computer Management,
5. Disk Management,
6. Find the USB drive (usually the last storage device before the optical drive),
7. Click on the USB drive,
8. Right click on it and you will see the options (New Partition or Format)
9. Follow the instruction (I chose FAT32), but please do NOT chose Quick Format.

FYI: fay32 doesn't support files larger than 2GB so if your putting movies than do NTFS.

To format as FAT32 you have to open an command prompt as admin. Window Button > All Programs > Accessories > Right CLICK command prompt and run as admin.

<VOL> = your drive letter ex E:
Command to format as FAT32

format <VOL> /FS:FAT32 /X

If the computer is prompting that the drive needs to be formatted, this means either the drive has become currupt (not likely) or that the drive hasn't been formatted or is an unrecognised format

if the hard drive was formatted on a Mac or Linux machine without choose Fat32 format, the drive will be prompted to be formatted under a windows machine

if there is no information on that drive, i'd suggest just formatting it

remember formatting a hard drive removes all information off that hard drive.

To Format Any Flash (USB) Drive

WARNING: This will permanently remove ALL data from your flash drive.

1) Insert the flash drive into a working usb port on your Windows PC.
2) Open "My Computer" in Windows XP or eariler OR "Computer" in Windows Vista/7
3) Right click on the Flash Drive (Usually labeled "Removable Disk")
4) Click "Format..."
5) Ensure that file system is "FAT32", Volume label is a name of your choosing, and that "Quick Format" is unchecked
6) Click "Start"
7) Windows will warn you that all data is about to be deleted. Click OK.
8) Once the format is complete, Windows will produce a pop-up window telling you so.

You now have a blank flash drive.

Hi,

Welcome to Fixya. If you want to use the drive to your PS3 Console you can still do a Quick Format on the Hard Drive but make sure you select Fat32 File System type to be able for the Ps3 to detect the hard drive. Make sure you use Windows XP or Windows 7 on formatting the hard drive to Fat32 because Windows Vista dont have Fat32 it uses ExFat.

Thanks for using Fixya.

Go to My Computer, right click on the drive, go to format. select fat32 on the type list. Remember that this will delete all of the files on the Hard Drive.

Trying to format a large external USB or Firewire hard drive to the FAT32 file system? Can't do it? Only see an option for formatting the drive using the NTFS file format? Well if you answered yes any of those questions, then you're at the right place.
I was recently trying to format my 1 TB MyBook external hard drive in Windows XP to FAT32 instead of the overly forced-upon NTFS format. Why? Well because I needed to connect it to a NAS device and the NTFS permissions were causing the NAS not to be able to access the drive. Simple solution is to use FAT32, no security, no problems. Though it's sometimes useful to format a USB drive in NTFS format.
Also, formatting a drive in FAT or FAT32 will allow it to be read by other operating systems, such as Mac, Linux, and older versions of Windows such as Windows 98.
Unfortunately, Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 will only format a removable drive in FAT32 if it's less than 32GB! Hmmm...that pretty much cuts out ALL modern external hard drives!
However, Windows can format a drive that is larger than 32GB in FAT32, but you have to use the DOS command prompt. However, if you have a drive that is 1TB or larger, you may still get an error saying "The volume is too big for FAT32".
In that case, you can use a free program called SwissKnife that will allow you to format an external hard drive that is up to 2TB in size. Let's go through both methods. In case you are having problems getting your external hard drive to show up in Windows, read my article on how to change the drive letter for an external drive in Windows.
Format external drive in FAT32 using DOSOpen a command window by going to Start, then Run and typing in CMD.

Now type in the following command at the prompt:

format /FS:FAT32 X:
Replace the letter X with the letter of your external hard drive in Windows. Windows will go ahead and begin formatting the drive in FAT32!

Format external hard drive in FAT32 using SwissKnifeSwissKnife is a nifty little program that is completely free and that you can use to format many types of external drives such as USB, Firewire, PCMIA, SATA and SCSI. You can also use it to create partitions on an external hard drive and it formats faster than Windows.

So next time you want to format a hard drive in FAT32 and Windows only gives you an option for NTFS, make sure to follow one of the two method mentioned above. Enjoy!

Open My Computer icon on the desktop. locate the hard disk you wish to format in FAT32. Make sure is not your main drive where windows was installed which is Drive C: Right click on the drive you want to format and select Format, a formatting window will pop out, there you see capacity which is the size of your hard drive,File system, and so on. Select the drop down menu under File system where we have NTFS and FAT32. Set it to FAT32. Under Format Options, Select Quick format and click Start. A warning message will pop out Click Ok to proceed. Wait a moment until the formatting is complete. Good luck.