mformat - add an MSDOS filesystem to a low-level formatted
floppy disk
Note of warning
This manpage has been automatically generated from
mtools's texinfo documentation, and may not be entirely
accurate or complete. See the end of this man page for
details.
Description
The mformat command is used to add an MS-DOS filesystem to
a low-level formatted diskette. Its syntax is:
mformat [-t cylinders] [-h heads] [-n sectors]
[-f size] [-1] [-4] [-8]
[-v volume_label]
[-F] [-S sizecode] [-X]
[-2 sectors_on_track_0] [-3]
[-0 rate_on_track_0] [-A rate_on_other_tracks]
[-M software_sector_size]
[-N serial_number] [-a]
[-C] [-H hidden_sectors] [-I fsVersion]
[-r root_sectors] [-L fat_len]
[-B boot_sector] [-k]
drive:
Mformat adds a minimal MS-DOS filesystem (boot sector,
FAT, and root directory) to a diskette that has already
been formatted by a Unix low-level format.
The following options are supported: (The S, 2, 1 and M
options may not exist if this copy of mtools has been com
piled without the USE_2M option)
The following options are the same as for Dos's format
command:
Options
v Specifies the volume label. A volume label identi
fies the disk and can be a maximum of 11 charac
ters. If you omit the -v switch, mlabel will assign
no label to the disk.
f Specifies the size of the DOS filesystem to format.
Only a certain number of predefined sizes are sup
ported by this flag; for others use the -h/-t/-n
flags. The following sizes are supported:
cylinders (for 5 1/4 DD)
180 160K, single-sided, 9 sectors per track, 40
cylinders (for 5 1/4 DD)
320 320K, double-sided, 8 sectors per track, 40
cylinders (for 5 1/4 DD)
360 360K, double-sided, 9 sectors per track, 40
cylinders (for 5 1/4 DD)
720 720K, double-sided, 9 sectors per track, 80
cylinders (for 3 1/2 DD)
1200 1200K, double-sided, 15 sectors per track,
80 cylinders (for 5 1/4 HD)
1440 1440K, double-sided, 18 sectors per track,
80 cylinders (for 3 1/2 HD)
2880 2880K, double-sided, 36 sectors per track,
80 cylinders (for 3 1/2 ED)
t Specifies the number of tracks on the disk.
h The number of heads (sides).
n Specifies the number of sectors per track. If the
2m option is given, number of 512-byte sector
equivalents on generic tracks (i.e. not head 0
track 0). If the 2m option is not given, number of
physical sectors per track (which may be bigger
than 512 bytes).
1 Formats a single side (equivalent to -h 1)
4 Formats a 360K double-sided disk (equivalent to -f
360). When used together with -the 1 switch, this
switch formats a 180K disk
8 Formats a disk with 8 sectors per track.
MSDOS format's q, u and b options are not supported, and s
has a different meaning.
The following options are specific to mtools:
F Format the partition as FAT32.
S The sizecode. The size of the sector is 2 ^ (size
code + 7).
for more details. The disk has first to be low-
level formatted using the xdfcopy utility included
in the fdutils package. XDF disks are used for
instance for OS/2 install disks.
2 2m format. The parameter to this option describes
the number of sectors on track 0, head 0. This
option is recommended for sectors bigger than nor
mal.
3 don't use a 2m format, even if the current geometry
of the disk is a 2m geometry.
0 Data transfer rate on track 0
A Data transfer rate on tracks other than 0
M software sector size. This parameter describes the
sector size in bytes used by the MS-DOS filesystem.
By default it is the physical sector size.
N Uses the requested serial number, instead of gener
ating one automatically
a If this option is given, an Atari style serial num
ber is generated. Ataris store their serial number
in the OEM label.
C creates the disk image file to install the MS-DOS
filesystem on it. Obviously, this is useless on
physical devices such as floppies and hard disk
partitions, but is interesting for image files.
H number of hidden sectors. This parameter is useful
for formatting hard disk partition, which are not
aligned on track boundaries (i.e. first head of
first track doesn't belong to the partition, but
contains a partition table). In that case the num
ber of hidden sectors is in general the number of
sectors per cylinder. This is untested.
I Sets the fsVersion id when formatting a FAT32
drive. In order to find this out, run minfo on an
existing FAT32 drive, and mail me about it, so I
can include the correct value in future versions of
mtools.
c Sets the size of a cluster (in sectors). If this
cluster size would generate a FAT that too big for
its number of bits, mtools automatically increases
the cluster size, until the FAT is small enough.
r Sets the size of the root directory (in sectors).
L Sets the length of the FAT.
B Use the bootsector stored in the given file or
device, instead of using its own. Only the geome
try fields are updated to match the target disks
parameters.
k Keep the existing boot sector as much as possible.
Only the geometry fields and other similar filesys
tem data are updated to match the target disks
parameters.
To format a diskette at a density other than the default,
you must supply (at least) those command line parameters
that are different from the default.
Mformat returns 0 on success or 1 on failure.
It doesn't record bad block information to the Fat, use
mbadblocks for that.
See Also
Mtools' texinfo doc
Viewing the texi doc
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mtools's texinfo documentation. However, this process is
only approximative, and some items, such as crossrefer
ences, footnotes and indices are lost in this translation
process. Indeed, these items have no appropriate repre
sentation in the manpage format. Moreover, not all infor
mation has been translated into the manpage version. Thus
I strongly advise you to use the original texinfo doc.
See the end of this manpage for instructions how to view
the texinfo doc.
* To generate a printable copy from the texinfo doc,
run the following commands:
./configure; make dvi; dvips mtools.dvi
* To generate a html copy, run:
./configure; make html
A premade html can be found at:
`http://mtools.linux.lu' and also at:
`http://www.tux.org/pub/knaff/mtools'
info mode), run:
./configure; make info
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