Most people are pretty good at keeping backups of their valuable data on external hard drives. But what happens if the drive becomes corrupted?

It's a lesson in why yous should ever brand an offsite fill-in with a cloud provider every bit well as a local re-create—only it's also late for that now.

Thankfully, if yous use a few little workarounds, you can reformat an external hard drive without losing everything on information technology.

Yes, It Is Possible!

A quick browse on the web's many tech forums reveals that too many people think "data recovery" and "format bulldoze" are mutually exclusive terms. They aren't.

It's perfectly possible to wipe your hard drive without losing all your data. The process requires yous to format your bulldoze, then use information recovery tools to salvage your information.

The methodology for the formatting part of the procedure differs depending on whether you're using a Windows computer or macOS. Nosotros're going to cover both platforms; keep reading to learn more.

How to Reformat a Drive on Windows

The process to reformat an external difficult drive on Windows is straightforward.

Firstly, connect your external difficult drive to your computer using a USB port. Wait for Windows to recognize the connected bulldoze.

Next, open up File Explorer, navigate to This PC in the left-hand column and click on the shortcut.

In the Devices and Drives section of the master window, you lot should encounter your external hard bulldoze. Right-click on the drive's icon to bring upward the context menu, then select Format from the list.

Make sure the Quick Format box is ticked and go out all the other settings the same.

quick format

Finally, click on the Format button and wait for the process to complete.

To reiterate—it is extremely of import to ensure the Quick Format checkbox has a tick in information technology. If y'all do a full format of your drive, you will lose all your data.

How to Reformat a Drive on Mac

macOS doesn't take a Quick Format box, but you can all the same achieve the aforementioned issue by tweaking a particular setting.

To brainstorm, open the Finder app and select Applications from the left-manus panel.

Scroll downwardly the list of applications until you come to the Utilities folder. Open up the folder and locate Disk Utility.

Within the Disk Utility app, you should meet your external hard drive listed nether External on the left-paw side of the screen. Click on your drive's name.

Now turn your attending to the top of the window and click on the Erase button. The operating system will prompt you lot to wipe the drive.

Do not proceed—yous need to click on the Security Options link. It'southward vital to ensure the slider is moved all the fashion to the left side of the scale. If the slider is non in the right position, y'all will lose some (or all) of your files. The information recovery process will be impossible.

Why Is Quick Format Important?

If you want to utilize data recovery software, you need to perform a Quick Format (or the Mac equivalent)—simply why?

Think of your files every bit books on a bookshelf. The filesystem is like the catalog that tells you where the books are kept. Performing a Quick Format is akin to throwing away the catalog but keeping the books themselves. You wouldn't be able to discover the books as easily, just they are still there.

In more than technical terms, a Quick Format simply deletes the file system journaling. Information technology doesn't overwrite the entire drive with binary zeroes. The files stay, only File Explorer/Finder can no longer see them because they don't have any information about where to look. The files remain in that location until they are overwritten with new information from the user.

Don't Add More Files

At this stage, it's imperative that yous don't write whatsoever new data to your difficult drive.

As we simply explained, any new information will directly overwrite the quondam (now hidden) files. And the overwriting won't take identify on a file-for-file ground. By sending a new file to your external hard drive, you could corrupt hundreds of the files that you demand to think.

Just move straight on using the data recovery software.

Using Data Recovery Software

Now it's fourth dimension to turn to a information recovery app. This is specialized software that tin can find files on a hard drive without a catalog that tells it where to look.

Quite a few data recovery apps have a gratis tier. Sometimes, the complimentary tier is restricted to a certain number of files or corporeality of storage. If you're trying to recover lots of data, you might demand to become your wallet out.

Here are 3 data recovery apps you tin can try:

1. Prosoft

Available on: Windows, Mac

Prosoft is a information recovery app that's available on both Windows and Mac. It tin can recover more than 100 different file types, recognize duplicate files amidst those you want to restore, and offers a recovery preview before you begin the process.

The free trial lets you see a preview and so you can be sure it'south going to piece of work before you buy.

Download: Prosoft (Free trial, $29/calendar month for a full license)

2. EaseUS Data Recovery Pro

ease data recovery

Available on: Windows, Mac

EaseUS Data Recovery Pro is probably the almost well-known data recovery app.

Unlike Prosoft, it lets you lot recover 2GB of data for free. All mainstream file types are supported.

If yous need to recover more than 2GB of data, you will need to pay for the Pro version. It costs $70 for a lifetime license.

Download: EaseUS Information Recovery Pro (Free, $70 for Pro)

3. Recuva

Available on: Windows

The Windows-only Recuva app falls under the CCleaner umbrella. It is free to download and use, and does non accept any information limits.

The $twenty Pro version adds support for virtual hard drives and automatic updates.

Download: Recuva (Free, $twenty for Pro)

Avoid Problems, Brand Multiple Backups

As we mentioned at the start, all these problems can easily be avoided if yous make multiple backups of your data.

At the very to the lowest degree, you lot should keep an onsite and offsite backup. In a dream world, have a backup on a NAS drive, with a deject storage provider, on an external hard drive, and with a dedicated backup app provider.