There were two ways to perform a low-level format in the past: one was through the functionality supported by the motherboard BIOS, but now most motherboards do not have this function; the other way is to use dedicated software. For example, DM, Lformat, etc. The operation steps of using Lformat are as follows:
1. Enter the program directory or drive A, and run Lformat.exe. When the prompt appears, press the Y key to continue with our program, or press any other key to exit.
2. Enter the Low level formatter.. interface, where you will see options such as Select Device (choose drive), Low Level Current Device (low-level format current hard drive), and Exit (exit). We choose Select Device, then press Enter.
3. A message box will then appear, showing the select drive screen. All drives are listed in numerical order as 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, etc. We first choose 1. Since most motherboards have multiple IDE interfaces, up to four hard drives can be connected (SCSI type motherboards and newer ones can connect up to eight hard drives). Usually, we use one IDE interface for the hard drive and another for the optical drive. As a hard drive connection cable has two interfaces, there are four options. However, Maxtor has warned before that it's best to directly select the hard drive to be low-level formatted because if there are several hard drives on the machine, accidentally selecting the wrong one and pressing Enter will format all of them. Regardless of how many hard drives are connected, let's choose one, say 1.
4. When we select 1 from the four options (0, 1, 2, 3), the displayed content includes: Current Device (current drive), Model (model), Serials (serial number), Firmware (firmware), etc. But we notice that this window does not seem to be what we want because everything shown is 0, and the model is not displayed. So we must have chosen the wrong one. No problem, let's start over. Press ESC to go back one step, choose the first item again, and this time select 0. A prompt window appears, and from the window, we can see that we should have the information we need. The drive is 0, and the model is an IBM product. Other details like serial numbers and chip versions vary by company. Below are the number of heads, sectors, maximum logical zones, etc.
5. After selecting the disk to be low-level formatted, choose the LOW LEVEL CURRENT DEVICE command in the displayed window. Immediately, a message window pops up asking "Do you want to use LBA Mode (if not sure press)(Y/N)?" We press the Y key to indicate we want to use LBA mode. This screen will show an additional information window confirming whether to use the logical address space. Hard drives larger than 540M need to use LBA mode; otherwise, it's unnecessary.
6. At this point, the system will display a formatting warning message window. Press the Y key to start formatting. After the low-level format is complete, press the ESC key. Then select the third option EXIT, press Enter to exit.
Low-level formatting is a time-consuming process, and the time required depends on the size of the hard drive and its damage condition. Additionally, low-level formatting is a destructive operation on the hard drive, so it should only be performed as a last resort.
Original article from Anhui Data Recovery Center: http://www.cndr.cn/hydt/16928.html