Introduction

I first learned how to use computers back in the early days of DOS. That knowledge of DOS has saved me countless times since. Even with the GUI of Windows, there were always some things that were just easier to do in DOS. There were also those tasks that were just done in DOS because there really wasn't a better way of doing it unless you owned a third-party application. One of those DOS-oriented tasks was Partioning and Formatting a hard drive using Fdisk. If you were putting a drive into a computer that didn't have an operating system already installed, then Fdisk or a third-party app was the way to go. However, with Windows 2000 or XP, starting from scratch with a new drive has gotten much simpler. During the install process, Windows will detect an unpartioned/formatted drive and will prompt you to set up that drive...Windows takes care of the rest.

However, this article will focus on adding a second (or more) hard drive to an existing system. If you already have Windows 2000 or Windows XP installed and are adding a second hard drive, there is an even easier way to partition and format that second drive than relying on Fdisk...using Windows' Disk Management.
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