Reformat SSD

ROUGH, INCOMPLETE, EDIT IN PROCESS......

[last updated: 2026-09-07]
Disclaimers
Linux home page
----------

• 2026-09-07:
  Had a 1TB SSD that had problems. For whatever reason, there was over 500GB of unused space that I couldn't access.
  Decided to reformat. Did the usual google for instructions.
• Recommended procedure:
  • Find desired drive:
    $ lsblk

    This will show which drive you want to use, eg. /dev/sda1

  • First unmount the drive:
    $ sudo umount /dev/sda1

  • Now one recommendation is to first wipe the disk by writing 0's to the target disk

  • What I did:
    $ sudo mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda1

    This executed without error, and gave me a disk with one folder "lost and found" that was perhaps read-only?
    In any case, I could not create a new folder in the root directory. The option was greyed out in right-click menu, and the file manager listing showed the lost and found folder with grey thingies on the icon

    
    Then I tried:

    $ cd /media/jay
    $ sudo chmod o=rwx [foldername]

    This seemed to work, as $ ls -l showed the new permissions.
    However now the folder icon in FM had an additional little grey thingie, don't remember which was first, but the two of them are:
    a little padlock, and an 'X'.

  • HOWEVER, it was substantially successful, in that I can now create a new folder. Properties shows 50GB used (for what???) but much better than 500 as it was before...

    
    Repeating the procedure with sudo chmod u=rwx did not change anything.

-----------------------------------------

eof