What Computer Formatting Means. To format a drive (hard disk, floppy disk, flash drive, etc.) means to prepare the chosen partition on the drive to be used by an operating system by deleting all the data and setting up a file system.

Why do we format?

Formatting the system removes all the files and errors and restores the computer to a blank state. It is almost always followed by installation of the operating system which means that the user would be able to use a fresh system. Maybe your computer has a black screen and will not start.

Will formatting a drive erase it?

Formatting a disk does not erase the data on the disk, only the address tables. ... However a computer specialist would be able to recover most or all the data that was on the disk before the reformat.