About Partitioning and Formatting Computers

A computer's disk must be partitioned and formatted before you can assign an operating system to it.

You can partition and format any FAT file system. For NTFS you must first convert the file system to FAT before installing the operating system.

Consistent Mode Computers

You can partition and format the factory installed disk on new Consistent Mode computers using CCM. Or you can partition the disk using Fdisk, and format it using CCM.

You can also format the factory installed disk without repartitioning it, although we recommend that you do partition the hard disk. Merely formatting the system drive will retain factory formatting that may be undesirable. For example, a hard disk formatted as FAT 32 rather than FAT 16.

Cooperative Mode Computers

For Cooperative Mode computers, you inform CCM about the existing partitioning and formatting on the computer.

Using CCM to Partition and Format

The partitioning and formatting you choose for a Consistent Mode computer is dependent on the operating system and associated CCM Pre-OS Agent package that you intend to install on the computer. CCM can partition up to four partitions on up to four disks.