Formatting software for multiple HDs

[Archman]

looking for software that will allow me to re-format multiple HDs, or thumbdrives at once inside Windows XP.

Thanks

 

[Archman]

anyone? bought a huge shipment of thumbdrives and they all came infected with viruses from the distributor... need to be formatted and have the files reinstalled... have a thousand, and it needs to be done for a promo asap this Sunday for a charity event.

What I have been doing is installing the thumbdrives into 8-port USB hubs and manually one by one formatting them... is there software that can format a bunch of them at once?

 

[kzrssk]

A little impatient... Save this as a .vbs file and use it. I haven't tested it, so I'd try it only on one first. I'm not trying to blow up your computer or anything, but if anything happens, I'm not liable.

On Error Resume Next

strAnswer = MsgBox("This will format all flash drives attached to your computer. Continue?", 4 + 48, "Format all flash drives")
If strAnswer = vbNo Then WScript.Quit

strComputer = "." 'Your computer
Set objWMIService = GetObject("winmgmts:{impersonationLevel=impersonate}!\\" & strComputer & "\root\cimv2") 'Make WMI connection
Set colDisks = objWMIService.ExecQuery("Select * from Win32_LogicalDisk") 'Enumerate all disks

For Each objDisk in colDisks 'For each of those disks...
strDrive = objDisk.DeviceID 'Get the drive's letter (ex: E:, F:, etc.)
strType = objDisk.DriveType 'Get the drive's type (We're looking for "Removable Disk")
Set colVolumes = objWMIService.ExecQuery("Select * from Win32_Volume Where Name = '" & strDrive & "\\'")
If strType = 2 Then 'If the drive is a removable disk (flash drive)...
For Each objVolume in colVolumes
objVolume.Format("FAT32") 'Format it using the FAT32 filesystem
Next
End If
Next

 

[Archman]

kzrssk, thank you very much I tried it, but it did not format the drive setup on drive E:

I was impatient because I was given two days to do this, but the deadline has since been moved I now have some breathing space. I also will be having to do another 3000 by the end of this week.

I also lucked out and found a program called SyncBack that allows me to copy files in parallel to all 23 flash drives.

 

[nweaver]

learn to script. You should be able to write a quick script that formats and copies, and just modify the drive letters affected, or give a list of drive letters when you invoke the program.


Command line ftw.

 

[Archman]

I ended up using two programs to do what I needed:

SyncBack

and

Robotask

Got robotask to automate formating the thumbdrives, and SyncBack to write the files in parallel to the thumbdrives. I was also able to write to 25 thumbdrives simultaneously!