Formatting C Drive

[wadylove]

Hi I was wondering if anyone call tell me why I have the option to format my C drive when I right click on it?
It was my understanding that you cannot format the drive that currently holds your OS, from within that OS
In my case this is windows 8.1

One person likened it to sitting on a chair while trying to lift it.

Yet if I right click on the C drive there is an option to format.

Can anyone help explain this?

Also I'm very sorry if this post is in the wrong place. I'm a complete novice

 

[Jad Chaar]

I think the only function for that is to create a partition. Let me explain: say you have 300GB of free space, you can format that free space into 2 seperate partitions (you can make as many as you want) of 150GB and 150GB (you can allocate any amount you want, like another combo can be 120GB for one and 180GB for the other, it can be anything) and Windows will recognize those partitions as separate disks, even though they are still on the same piece of hardware. It is a nice software modification. If you are interested in reading more, you can go to this MS site.

 

[cliffordcooley]

The option to format C: may be there. But if you ever try Windows will detect it is a system drive and abort the process.

 

[Tmagic650]

Yes, when a boot hard drive is in use you cannot format it. Formatting is done before Windows is loaded. You can format using the Windows install disk or by restoring the Operating System to a factory "fresh" state