Windows 10: How to delete contents of a Linux formatted external disk?

I have this USB disk that is formatted using Linux system (I believe it is ext2 or ext3).
It is used to save TV-recordings. I use Linux Reader to copy these recordings onto my Windows pc.

Am looking for a portable tool, similar to Linux Reader, that can also delete the contents of this external drive.

Right now, I only know of 1 method: from USB using Paragon Harddisk Manager and format the external drive.

Any alternatives ?

Thanks

:)

 

Accessing External Hard Drive in Windows 10

I have read everyone's questions and replies on this problem I think. I haven't found one that answered the question as to why all of a sudden external hard drives (formatted in Fat 32, using a USB connection) are not showing up under My Computer. The
drive shows up under device manager to be working properly. Load a Linux Mint XFCE Live CD and all the contents of the external drive show up.

Why was I able to access the hard drive in Windows 7 and in Windows 10 for a period of time and Now I longer am able to. What has the new Formatting of Windows caused? Question is how do I over come it.

Linux Mint XFCE is now warning you that some features of their software may not function due to the EUFI (spelling) formating on the hard drive, if you are running both Windows and Linux as I am.

Someone please help because I am lost.

N.Vaughn

 

Cannot open hard drive with Windows 10 after backup

Hi mate.

Can you upload the exact content of the error message? Also, did you performed any health diagnostic tests on the drive?

You can try to open the content of your external drive with Linux Live CD. You can do that by following these steps:

1. Download and burn the ISO image of Linux to a CD or USB.

2. Once you do this, go in BIOS and change the boot order to the media you burned the Linux on.

3. Restart the computer and when it loads, try and mount the drives (or if Linux can read it, it will mount by itself).

4. See if you can access the data stored there and if you do you can transfer it to another location.

Let us know how it went.

 

I like making a live Linux USB and that will have direct access to any Linux disk or partition. Than you can delete add or modify anything from it as you wish. Program like: LinuxLive USB Creator can download a selected Linux distro and make any USB drive bootable.

 

I fully agree with @CountMike

It is absolutely the best way to go. While there exist a lot of Linux FS driver and software implementations for Windowss, they are far from reliable and just overcomplicates things. If you have a bootable USB (or DVD) with a Linux distribution, you get easily access to most Linux FS formats (even the more exotic ones) and all simply just works without breaking anything on the HDD.

 

If you can get the TV internet/local network connected, then it should be possible to do this over the network from any PC with any OS.

You could then both copy and delete whatever you want, without ever having to remove the drive from your TV. But all this of course highly depend on what TV model you have and if it has support for local network sharing. (Most TVs only act as a media server, so only playback is supported but no delete operations are allowed)

 

Or if you are happy to delete everything you could re-format it FAT32 or ExFat (you could copy the data you want to save to your PC first).

Most TV/Set-top boxes support FAT filesystems (mine always have anyway) but they don't support NTFS.

 

Thank you all for the comments. Please do consider that I have no knowledge at all of Linux commands. The only thing I want to do is to be able to simply delete what is on the disk. Quickly checked out LinuxLive USB Creator, but I am a little unsure how to proceed.
Say, I downloaded a portable version, say I run this, it will then create a Linux bootable USB drive
I reboot using the USB thumbdrive... then what?
End up in some command line environment or something, totally different from Windows?

Hm...
sorry, but I just think of it... I can attach the drive to the tv setup box and can delete the contents there.
yes, I admit... a bit dumb that I did not think of it...

But then again basically the issue still exists.

Gave LinuxLive USB Creator a try, after selecting the USB drive, I need to select my favourite Linux ... I can select from I guess some 100 entries. Huh..? No idea...

 

Most Linux distros have graphical interface and all hove some kind of File manager so no need for any console commands. Works same way as windows do. Puppy Linux is probably smallest and easiest and Slacko variant looks almost like windows.

 

Thank you. I checked around, specifically for 'beginners' and found following site
Which Is The Best Linux Distro For Beginners? — 2017 Edition

Somewhere in the beginning it says "
Well, the answer lies in the fact that Linux Mint was created with a goal to provide an out-of-the-box experience to the newbies.
"
Will try to reboot from that one ... see what happens

 

Mint is my favorite too.

 

I got it running etc. All drives were listed, also the contents of this "Linux" USB drive.
Everything fine, except...
delete, permissions, they were greyed out : owner is 'root' (?)
Don't know, gave up. It seems not so straightforward after all.

 

BTW I also tried with Ubuntu, but it hanged at the start.
A good working solution :
Linux File Systems for Windows by Paragon Software
Linux File Systems for Windows | Paragon Software

It worked flawlessly, even within VMware Workstation.

Actually it is a fully functional version and free to use for 10 days, but then again, the price is very low.
One minor drawback: there is no USB thumbdrive version, i.e. it can't be installed on an USB thumbdrive.

 

I have always had a problem with synthetic drivers. Read access is always OK but writing always causes a problem.

I run MacOS, Windows and Linux and have tried various drivers to do read/write on the others file systems and they are uniformly crap. Paragon are generally better than the alternatives but be aware there are lots of threads about ExtFS corrupting drives and making them unreadable. The same goes for NTFS-3G and all the others I've tried from the other side.

Your best bet is to find a shared file system that you can read/write to natively but even this causes problems. For example MacOS will format and use a disk in ExFAT but it will be corrupted if you use it with Windows. If you format it in Windows MacOS will use it fine forever.

For a drive you want to use on a TV box you want to go for the lowest common denominator which is FAT32. This is free for manufacturers to use (which is why it is included) and as long as your individual files are less than 4GB would be the best solution. You don't have the bells and whistles of a modern FS (error correction, authority etc) but it will definitely work.

Note that you can keep using Paragon ExtFS after 10 days just the transfer rate drops to 5Mb/s (basically useless for transfer but may work for deleting things as you are only deleting the partition table entry which is tiny).

 

I assume you want to delete the entire HDD and use in Windows


in Windows CMD (elevated)

simply DISPART
LIST DISK get list of HDD's you can see the one with Linux system on it

then type DISK nn where nn is Disk nr selected from List Disk
CLEAN

create partition primary
format fs=ntfs quick


Job done

Another way if you have access to a Linux system is to simply delete the contents but that will still leave a Linux fs on the HDD. If the HDD is on a NAS you can simply delete from Windows if the HDD is shared.

The simplest way is just use the command line in windows like I've described.

Now if you want to use the HDD again on a Linux system just create a new fs on it with a command like mkfs.ext4 /dev/sdx or wherever it's mounted (that will create an EXT4 fs but you can create XFS or whatever).

Cheers
jimbo