Previously card wrote:

> For reasons too long to explain, I formatted my 2GB AData microSD card
> to FAT16 instead of 32. Shortly after, I found out that that wasn't a
> good idea, as when I reinserted it into my adapter and into the PC, it
> wouldn't recognize it anymore.
> I tried two different readers (one microsd direct reader and a miniSD
> convertor one) on two different PCs, both running on WinXP.
> What I want to do is reformat this on FAT32 so I can get on with it as
> before. Is there a way to do this, or is it beyond repair? I kinda need
> it now and in the near future, so going out and buying another isn't an
> answer for me.

> Thanks!

Typically formatting it to FAT16 shpuld not cause any significant
problems, except large cluster size and reduced space. It should
vcertainly not damage the card in any way.

I suspect the card is either broken (no relation to the FAT16
formatting) or there is some compatibility issue with the
(as usual) broken Microsofr OS. You can try wiping the
card wih one of the many free disk wipers out there.


Arno

You can use bootitng to make a bootable CD that's free until you install
it on the HD and exceed the free trial. When it boots skip install and
go to maintenance. You can delete the partition on the card and make a
new one for fat32 and format it.

I'm assuming that will work since on my memory sticks I do that but I
make them NTFS.

---
Ed Light

Better World News TV Channel:
http://realnews.com

Bring the Troops Home:
http://bringthemhomenow.org
http://antiwar.com

Iraq Veterans Against the War:
http://ivaw.org
http://couragetoresist.org

Send spam to the FTC at
spam@uce.gov
Thanks, robots.

Why would anyone go to all that trouble? Disk Managment will do all that.

"Ed Light" wrote in message news:kdbek.69$2A5.9@fe127.usenetserver.com...
> You can use bootitng to make a bootable CD that's free until you install
> it on the HD and exceed the free trial. When it boots skip install and
> go to maintenance. You can delete the partition on the card and make a
> new one for fat32 and format it.
>
> I'm assuming that will work since on my memory sticks I do that but I
> make them NTFS.

Eric Gisin wrote:
> Why would anyone go to all that trouble? Disk Managment will do all that.
>
> "Ed Light" wrote in message
> news:kdbek.69$2A5.9@fe127.usenetserver.com...
>> You can use bootitng to make a bootable CD that's free until you
>> install it on the HD and exceed the free trial. When it boots skip
>> install and go to maintenance. You can delete the partition on the
>> card and make a new one for fat32 and format it.
>>
>> I'm assuming that will work since on my memory sticks I do that but I
>> make them NTFS.
>

In the end, it's the excellence of the method. :-)

Seriously, I just tried it your way but delete partition was greyed out.

---
Ed Light

Better World News TV Channel:
http://realnews.com

Bring the Troops Home:
http://bringthemhomenow.org
http://antiwar.com

Iraq Veterans Against the War:
http://ivaw.org
http://couragetoresist.org

Send spam to the FTC at
spam@uce.gov
Thanks, robots.

"Ed Light" wrote in message news:xdzek.15940$Oq1.6624@fe95...
> Eric Gisin wrote:
>>> You can use bootitng to make a bootable CD that's free until you
>
>> Why would anyone go to all that trouble? Disk Managment will do all that.
>>
> In the end, it's the excellence of the method. :-)
>
> Seriously, I just tried it your way but delete partition was greyed out.
>
Because the SD card had no partition table, like a floppy. Which is usually preferable.

Eric Gisin wrote:
> "Ed Light" wrote in message
> news:xdzek.15940$Oq1.6624@fe95...
>> Eric Gisin wrote:
>>>> You can use bootitng to make a bootable CD that's free until you
>>
>>> Why would anyone go to all that trouble? Disk Managment will do all
>>> that.
>>>
>> In the end, it's the excellence of the method. :-)
>>
>> Seriously, I just tried it your way but delete partition was greyed out.
>>
> Because the SD card had no partition table, like a floppy. Which is
> usually preferable.

I'm no expert, but why, then, could I create an NTFS partition and
format it in Windows? On a thumb drive.

To the original point, I can do it with bootitng. XP won't.
---
Ed Light

Better World News TV Channel:
http://realnews.com

Bring the Troops Home:
http://bringthemhomenow.org
http://antiwar.com

Iraq Veterans Against the War:
http://ivaw.org
http://couragetoresist.org

Send spam to the FTC at
spam@uce.gov
Thanks, robots.

Previously Ed Light wrote:
> Eric Gisin wrote:
>> "Ed Light" wrote in message
>> news:xdzek.15940$Oq1.6624@fe95...
>>> Eric Gisin wrote:
>>>>> You can use bootitng to make a bootable CD that's free until you
>>>
>>>> Why would anyone go to all that trouble? Disk Managment will do all
>>>> that.
>>>>
>>> In the end, it's the excellence of the method. :-)
>>>
>>> Seriously, I just tried it your way but delete partition was greyed out.
>>>
>> Because the SD card had no partition table, like a floppy. Which is
>> usually preferable.

> I'm no expert, but why, then, could I create an NTFS partition and
> format it in Windows? On a thumb drive.

Unless it actually is a floppy, you have two choices:

1)''Superfloppy'', i.e. without partition table
2)Partitioned

In the first case the wholde device is layed out much like a
partition. You can even partition a floppy, but MS OSes are
brain-damaged and cannot deal with that.

The reason this is non-obvious on Windows is that MS thinks
it needs to protect its customers from this ''advanced''
things. They could get confused otherwise.

Arno

"Ed Light" wrote in message
news:487b8859$0$18580$c3e8da3@news.astraweb.com...
> Eric Gisin wrote:
>> "Ed Light" wrote in message news:xdzek.15940$Oq1.6624@fe95...
>>> Eric Gisin wrote:
>>>>> You can use bootitng to make a bootable CD that's free until you
>>>
>>>> Why would anyone go to all that trouble? Disk Managment will do all that.
>>>>
>>> In the end, it's the excellence of the method. :-)
>>>
>>> Seriously, I just tried it your way but delete partition was greyed out.
>>>
>> Because the SD card had no partition table, like a floppy. Which is usually preferable.
>
> I'm no expert, but why, then, could I create an NTFS partition and format it in Windows? On a
> thumb drive.
>
> To the original point, I can do it with bootitng. XP won't.
>
Sure it will. You don't create partitions of "a type", you select the type during format.

>> To the original point, I can do it with bootitng. XP won't.
>>
> Sure it will. You don't create partitions of "a type", you select the
> type during format.

You have to have a partition to format in the 1st place. You can't
format free space.

--
---
Ed Light

Better World News TV Channel:
http://realnews.com

Bring the Troops Home:
http://bringthemhomenow.org
http://antiwar.com

Iraq Veterans Against the War:
http://ivaw.org
http://couragetoresist.org

Send spam to the FTC at
spam@uce.gov
Thanks, robots.

Previously Ed Light wrote:

>>> To the original point, I can do it with bootitng. XP won't.
>>>
>> Sure it will. You don't create partitions of "a type", you select the
>> type during format.

> You have to have a partition to format in the 1st place. You can't
> format free space.

You can actually. Under Windows you still need something
like a pseudo-partition (called ''Superfloppy'' structure),
but under Linux, e.g., you can format any block device with a
filesystem, without any partitioning or device-superblock
at all.

Arno

Arno:

I used bootitng to remove the NTFS partition on the thumb drive.
Amazingly, XP Home did let me create a partition on it. Just FAT32,
though. But it won't let me remove the partition, so if you want to
scratch a bad partition you would need bootitng, not just windows. Now
to go put the NTFS back ...
---
Ed Light

Better World News TV Channel:
http://realnews.com

Bring the Troops Home:
http://bringthemhomenow.org
http://antiwar.com

Iraq Veterans Against the War:
http://ivaw.org
http://couragetoresist.org

Send spam to the FTC at
spam@uce.gov
Thanks, robots.

Ed Light wrote:
> Arno:
>
> I used bootitng to remove the NTFS partition on the thumb drive.
> Amazingly, XP Home did let me create a partition on it. Just FAT32,
> though. But it won't let me remove the partition, so if you want to
> scratch a bad partition you would need bootitng, not just windows. Now
> to go put the NTFS back ...

Very strange. I created an NTFS partition on the thumb drive using
bootitng ("BING"). It has to be formatted in Windows. Upon being
Welcomed into the sacred shrine of XP Home, I went to Disk Management,
where it would only offer to format in FAT32. Hmm.

I went to my free version of PowerDesk 5 and right-clicked on the thumb
drive. There I could format it NTFS. Back in business.

Compared to FAT 32, the thumb drive rips through groups of little files
in NTFS. However, I did get a corrupt file once. I think that was
related to one backup program, which I stopped using on thumb drives,
but I've been running with write cacheing on and had no further trouble,
whether because of that or not.
---
Ed Light

Better World News TV Channel:
http://realnews.com

Bring the Troops Home:
http://bringthemhomenow.org
http://antiwar.com

Iraq Veterans Against the War:
http://ivaw.org
http://couragetoresist.org

Send spam to the FTC at
spam@uce.gov
Thanks, robots.

Eric Gisin wrote in news:AvadnefYL9NfPObVnZ2dnUVZ_hSdnZ2d@posted.unise rvecommunications
> "Ed Light" wrote in message
> news:487b8859$0$18580$c3e8da3@news.astraweb.com...
> > Eric Gisin wrote:
> > > "Ed Light" wrote in message news:xdzek.15940$Oq1.6624@fe95...
> > > > Eric Gisin wrote:
> > > > > > You can use bootitng to make a bootable CD that's free until you
> > > >
> > > > > Why would anyone go to all that trouble? Disk Managment will do all that.
> > > > >
> > > > In the end, it's the excellence of the method. :-)
> > > >
> > > > Seriously, I just tried it your way but delete partition was greyed out.
> > > >
> > > Because the SD card had no partition table, like a floppy. Which is usually preferable.
> >
> > I'm no expert, but why, then, could I create an NTFS partition and format it in Windows? On a
> > thumb drive.
> >
> > To the original point, I can do it with bootitng. XP won't.
> >

> Sure it will.

> You don't create partitions of "a type",

Yes, you do. Whether it makes any difference .......

> you select the type during format.

Previously, on Usenet Ed Light wrote:

>You have to have a partition to format in the 1st place. You can't
>format free space.

Once my brother had bought a new HD. He meant to have it in just one
large partition, so he did not partition it. Still he must have
formatted it because he installed Windows on it and loaded other
software and files on it too.

But it behaved strangely and he found that he had duplicates of many
(all?) files on it. That is when he called me.
On my asking he insisted that he had _not_ partioned it.

This was obviously a mistake by him, but he was not new to computers
and knew well enough what partioning means. I am quite sure he had
actually not partioned the drive at all.

This was in the days of W98 and he would have done the formatting in
Dos.


Lars
Stockholm

Lars wrote:
> Once my brother had bought a new HD. He meant to have it in just one
> large partition, so he did not partition it.
--
> But it behaved strangely and he found that he had duplicates of many
> (all?) files on it.

That's amazing!

--
Ed Light

Better World News TV Channel:
http://realnews.com

Bring the Troops Home:
http://bringthemhomenow.org
http://antiwar.com

Iraq Veterans Against the War:
http://ivaw.org
http://couragetoresist.org

Send spam to the FTC at
spam@uce.gov
Thanks, robots.

"Squeeze" wrote in message
news:4887246d$1$13866$8f2e0ebb@news.shared-secrets.com...
> Eric Gisin wrote in news:AvadnefYL9NfPObVnZ2dnUVZ_hSdnZ2d@posted.unise rvecommunications
>> "Ed Light" wrote in message
>> news:487b8859$0$18580$c3e8da3@news.astraweb.com...
>> > Eric Gisin wrote:
>> > I'm no expert, but why, then, could I create an NTFS partition and format it in Windows? On a
>> > thumb drive.
>> >
>> > To the original point, I can do it with bootitng. XP won't.
>> >
>
>> Sure it will.
>
>> You don't create partitions of "a type",
>
> Yes, you do. Whether it makes any difference .......
>
>> you select the type during format.

The created partition type is 07 (HPFS/NTFS),
but formatting will always reset that to match the FS.
Which is quite different from DOS-like tools.