On 6/18/2012 5:48 PM, Jacob Smith wrote:
> Thank you very much I understand a lot better now, but if you don'
> mind I've got a couple more questions. What happens if an error (cut
> power/communication) causes one of the links not to be recognized, but the
> other one still is? what does formatting do?
>
I don't know what redundancies Windows (or any other operating system) 
has built into it, but if an unrecoverable error occurs, then there are 
several possibilities.  A file could be lost or corrupted or many files 
or the whole file system.  If you trash the file system, then you need 
to reformat and start from scratch.

There is a low-level format done at the factory which maps out the bits 
on the platter and puts the bad spots into a table of bad spots.  High 
level formatting divides the disk into sectors (size depending on the 
file system) or "groups" as I called them, each one containing the 
links, the data area, and whatever.  Go to Wikipedia and search for NTFS 
and examine it and the related links.  Also check out "File Allocation 
Table."

So, in short, formatting builds the file system on a drive.  It creates 
all the necessary tables, divides up the drive into sectors, and writes 
links and other necessary information to the sectors.

As you can see from the articles in Wikipedia, it can get pretty 
complicated.  My knowledge is dated and sort of over-simplified, but 
it's all I really need for what I do.

Dean

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