FDFORMAT

Section: Linux Programmer's Manual (8)
Updated: 1 February 1993
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NAME

fdformat - Low-level formats a floppy disk

SYNOPSIS

fdformat [-n] device

DESCRIPTION

fdformat does a low level format on a floppy disk. device is usually one of the following (for floppy devices, the major = 2, and the minor is shown for informational purposes only):


/dev/fd0d360  (minor = 4)
/dev/fd0h1200 (minor = 8)
/dev/fd0D360  (minor = 12)
/dev/fd0H360  (minor = 12)
/dev/fd0D720  (minor = 16)
/dev/fd0H720  (minor = 16)
/dev/fd0h360  (minor = 20)
/dev/fd0h720  (minor = 24)
/dev/fd0H1440 (minor = 28)

/dev/fd1d360  (minor = 5)
/dev/fd1h1200 (minor = 9)
/dev/fd1D360  (minor = 13)
/dev/fd1H360  (minor = 13)
/dev/fd1D720  (minor = 17)
/dev/fd1H720  (minor = 17)
/dev/fd1h360  (minor = 21)
/dev/fd1h720  (minor = 25)
/dev/fd1H1440 (minor = 29)

The generic floppy devices, /dev/fd0 and /dev/fd1, will fail to work with fdformat when a non-standard format is being used, or if the format has not been autodetected earlier. In this case, use setfdprm(8) to load the disk parameters.

For ATAPI IDE floppy driver (also known as LS-120 drives or "Superdisk" drives) you have to use the floppy(8).

OPTIONS

-n: No verify. This option will disable the verification that is performed after the format.

AUTHOR

Werner Almesberger (almesber@nessie.cs.id.ethz.ch)

AVAILABILITY

The fdformat command is part of the util-linux-ng package and is available from ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux-ng/.