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Formatting the Drive
in Mac OS 9
Before you can re-format the Drive you will need to restart
your computer from the Mac OS 9 System Software CD that
come with your computer or which you purchased as an
upgrade.
1. Disable any anti-virus software you may have running in
the background.
2. Insert the System Software CD into your CD drive.
3. With your AcomData Drive connected and powered on,
restart the computer and hold down the C key while the
computer is starting up.
4. You will see the alert message: “This disk is unreadable by
this computer. Do you want to initialize this disk?” Click
OK.
5. In the Name field, type in a name for your Drive. You
should give the drive a unique name that will allow you
to easily distinguish it from other hard drives or storage
devices.
6. From the Format menu, select Mac OS Extended.
7. Click Initialize. You should then get the alert message:
“Initializing will erase all information on this disk.” Click
Continue. Once initializing is complete, you should see
the Drive mounted on your Desktop with the name you
assigned.
8. Restart your computer and eject the Mac OS 9 CD, or go
to Control Panels--> Startup Disk and select the comput-
er’s startup disk. Restart the computer.
Formatting the Drive
in Mac OS X
1. Disable any anti-virus software you may have running in
the background.
2. Launch the Disk Utility application (Applications folder >
Utilities folder > Disk Utility). The Disk Utility window will
open with a small window at left and a larger window
with a series of tabs at the top.
3. You should see the Drive listed in the left window. Click
on the Drive to highlight it. Information about the Drive
will appear in the Information window.
4. Click on the Erase tab. In the Erase window you will see a
Volume Format pop-up menu and a Name field.
5. From the Volume Format pop-up, select Mac OS
Extended. (With Mac OS 10.3.x, you have the option of
selecting Mac OS Extended (Journaled). (Journaling is a
feature that helps protect the file system against power
outages or hardware failures, reducing the need for
repairs. We recommend using journaling, if available.)
6. In the Name field, type in a name for the Drive. You
should give the drive a unique name that will allow you
to easily distinguish it from other hard drives or storage
devices.
7. Click Erase. You should see an alert pop up with the mes-
sage: “Erasing a disk will destroy all information on all of
the volumes of the disk…” Click Erase.
Once initializing is complete, you should see the Drive listed
in the left window of the Disk Utility screen with whatev-
er name you assigned. Quit Disk Utility. You should now
see the Drive icon on the Desktop.
