Creating a System Floppy Disk

Back in the early days of Windows, creating a system floppy disk was pretty common. Although, newer desktops and laptops are not shipping with floppy drives installed, so this task is slowly becoming a lost art.

System requirements: a computer with floppy drive, and Windows XP installed, and a 3.5" floppy disk that can be formatted.

• Insert a floppy into the disk drive, that you want to format. Warning: All the data on this disk will be destroyed.
• Launch the Windows Explorer (In the Start Menu, click on 'My Computer').
• Right-click the floppy drive icon, and select the Format option.
• A Format dialog will be displayed
• The following options can be set in the Format dialog:
  
• Capacity: Specifies the capacity of the floppy that you are formatting (1.44MB is the default).
• File System: Specifies the file system for floppy (FAT is the default)
• Allocation Unit Size: Leave at 'Default allocation size' unless you have a reason to change it.
• Volume Label: Enter a label for yourfloppy disk if you want.
• Quick Format: Check this option to quickly format disks that were previously formatted.
• Create an MS-DOS startup disk: Check this option to copy system files to make the floppy bootable
• Press the Start button to begin formatting the disk.

After you press the Start button, you will be warned that all the information on the floppy disk will be destroyed. Press the OK if you want to proceed.

Notes:

• Some floppy will not format due to media errors, if this happens you will have to insert another disk.
• If your computer's hard drive is formatted with NTFS, you can not use this system disk to access the local file system.