FORMattinG LinuX
 

hey there..



is there a way to format/erase everything on a linux partition before making a new system install???


when reinstalling linux from sctarch the setup is formatting the hard drive right ? well is it actually deleting everything and then proceeds to install ?

or when reinstalling linux is it just copying the new files over to the ones which are already on the drive ?


and/or is there a way to format/erase everything on a linux partition before making a new system install???

MoSt DisTRos (oops, sorry, I was looking at your title ;) ) give you the option to erase and format, or to not, when you install. It all depends on what option you choose.

Steve

well it does but does it actually erase it all ? cuz it takes about 10-15 secs top...

yes, it erases it all.

it's super fast because it's not doing the optional bad block check, as modern filesystems can handle bad blocks on their own.

You might want to know that most 'modern' Windows installs usually force you into a format with a bad block check. If you've got more than 50G of space, you can take your dog out twice for a walk before it's done ...

While linux does "delete" the data on the hard drive, it doesn't really erase the drive. To do that you would have to do a low level format that would reset every sector on the drive to 0. You can do that by doing dd if =/dev/zero of=/dev/hda. Granted this is not something you'll probably ever need to do, the standard linux installers, all just reformat the drive, by basicly just loosing track of whats on the drive, and starting a new file system.

thanx alot