▷ How to initialize hard drive in windows 10 new

Expanding the storage options of our computer is one of the most common and most carried out actions, if we are fans of movies or games, we will need large storage capacities. The current computers come with enough factory capacity, around 1TB or 2 (1024 GB), but if we have one from a few years ago, surely we need to buy a new hard drive at some point.

The type of hard drive matters

Depending on what we want to store on our new hard drive, we are going to need a certain type of hard drive. There are basically two types of hard drives, the traditional ones, which are mechanical and have a large storage capacity, and the smaller, faster, more expensive and smaller capacity SSDs. When are we interested in buying one or the other?

Mechanical Hard Drives or HDDs: These disks have capacities greater than 1 TB in their vast majority, currently reaching up to 16 TB like those of Seagate. In addition, its capacity / price ratio is much better than SSDs. We are going to need one of these if we want to store a large number of files or make backup copies of other data.

SSD Storage Drives: These types of hard drives are the fastest currently available, but also quite expensive and with not too much storage capacity (maximum 960 GB). We will buy one of these units if we need to install the operating system and programs inside it. Currently it is almost necessary to have one of them, even if it is 120 GB to install our operating system, since it will go much faster than if we installed it on a classic hard drive. We will need it of considerable size if we also want to install games within it.

How to initialize hard drive in Windows 10 when we have bought it new

Having described the primary utility of the two basic types of hard drives, the treatment in Windows 10 is exactly the same. Regarding the system, in terms of formatting and partitions, we will be able to do it in the same way, whatever the drive we have.

What we must take into account is that, in most cases, when connecting a new hard disk to our computer, we will not see it if we access "This equipment". Do not worry because it is not broken, this is because it does not have a format or letter assigned yet, so this is what we are going to do to initialize the hard disk and use it.

Initialize hard drive in Windows 10 with Diskpart (commands)

The first way we will see to initialize a hard disk is through the Diskpart command. To use it we will need to access the Windows command terminal, since it is a tool whose interaction must be done by entering commands.

In our case we are going to use Windows PowerShell, but we could also use Command Prompt, the operation is exactly the same in both terminals. To start Windows PowerShell, we will have to right-click on the start button, and choose the Windows PowerShell (administrator) option .

We could also have done it by writing in the start menu " PowerShell " and clicking on " Start as administrator ", but we see this method faster and more useful.

The following will be to place the command to enter the program:

diskpart

After a few seconds the command promt will be renamed " DISKPART> ", we will be in the program.

If we wanted to know all the options that we have available in the program, we would only have to write anything to show them.

The first thing we are going to do is list the hard drives that are in our computer:

list disk

It will show us the hard drives that are installed. In our case we have three hard drives, of which two of them are newly purchased and unformatted. To know what the new hard drive is, we will need to know what storage capacity it has. Knowing this, we must keep the number assigned to them in the “ Disc No. ” section.

We then select the disk that we want to initialize:

select disk

To make sure, let's clean up the partition table on disk:

clean

Next, we are going to create a primary partition, which can either occupy the entire hard disk or the space that we want to give it, to make several of them. We are going to create two partitions, one 25GB and the other with the rest of the available space for a 100GB hard drive.

create partition primary size =

create partition primary

list partition

When we create them, we list the result to see their number, since it will be important to leave them active with the following steps. We must stay, once again with the number of these partitions.

It's time to format the partitions and assign them a name and letter to make them work, so let's get to it. First with partition 1:

select partition

format fs = NTFS quick label = ” ”

The typical format for Windows partitions will be NTFS, so it will be the one we use. There is also the VFAT and EXFAT.

activate

We activate the partition.

assign letter =

We assign a letter so that the system recognizes it.

At this moment, we will already have the partition visible in the file explorer, but we still have another slope in which we must do exactly the same.

We see that we have done the same, selecting partition 2 and assigning another letter and name.

Let's go to the file explorer to see the results.

We see that both partitions are indeed perfectly created and ready to be used.

Initialize hard drive in Windows 10 with Hard Drive Admirer (graphical)

The second way to do it, will be through the Windows hard disk management tool. Using this tool we can initialize a hard disk and also make all kinds of partitions on them, etc. The program is available natively in all current versions of Windows, and everything is done graphically, so we don't need to install absolutely anything.

If we remember, we had two new hard drives installed on our computer. Using the previous method we have already activated one, now it is the turn of the other, so we will use the Hard Disk Manager to do it.

As in the previous case, we are going to go to the start menu and right click on it. At this moment we are going to select the " disk management " option.

When the tool starts, it will automatically detect that there is an uninitialized hard drive. It will notify us of this so that we can initialize it directly. We select the disk, the option " MBR ", and click on " accept ".

Now we will be located in a graphical environment where the hard drives that are on our computer are displayed, as well as a bar divided into pieces that represent the partitions. We will notice that there is a hard disk with the bar in black, this will be the one that interests us, and the black color means that it has no active partitions yet.

So let's see how to create a partition in this program. In the same way that one of them is created, the others will be created. Then we right-click on the black bar and choose the " New Simple Volume " option.

A wizard will start in which we will have to place the space we want to give to the partition. If we use the entire hard disk, we will only have to click on " Next ".

Next we will have to assign a letter to the volume.

We will also need to choose the file system, which in this case will be NTFS. As with Diskpart we will have to put a name to the partition and choose if we want to format and in what way. We recommend the option " format quickly ".

After a summary of what we are going to do, click on " Finish " to proceed. The hard drive will immediately go into active status with the blue bar. Now we can use this unit to store our files.

As we have seen, using both methods it is quite easy to initialize hard disk in Windows 10. We will always have to do this every time we buy and install a new hard disk in our computer. Whether it is SSD or HDD; the procedure will be exactly the same.

If you want to know more tricks for your hard drives, we recommend these tutorials:

Did you know that when comparing a new hard drive it was necessary to do this? We hope you found the tutorial useful.