You should be able to partition and format your drive OK using XP. It's just treated as an external drive. George. From: access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Phil Stephenson Sent: 23 August 2008 08:58 To: access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Subject: [access-uk] Formatting a hard drive in a usb cradle Hi, I want to format the hard drive from my dead Toshiba laptop which I've got housed in a USB cradle to connect to my desktop. I want to do a complete format i.e. to leave me with a clean drive so I can use as an extra usb storage drive for my desktop. Can I do this using Win XP tools or do I need some additional software? Your help greatfully appreciated, Phil t __________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus signature database 3381 (20080822) __________ The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus. http://www.eset.com