Want to Format CD-R or CD-RW on Windows 11/10? You can do this easily with your desktop computer or laptop! This piece to use your Windows or Mac computer to format a CD-RW or DVD-RW that won’t play or load information.
A CD-R or DVD-R that has already been burned or written to can’t be formatted. When you format a CD, all of the files on it will be erased. As time goes on, portable storage devices like SD cards, USB flash drives, and small external hard drives seem to replace CDs and DVDs.
But there are still some people who like to store their files and video files on the “Old Schell” style storage media. No. Once a CD or CD-R is made, it can’t be changed. It can’t be updated, erased, formatted, or changed in any other way. If you already made the CD or CD-R and want to change it, use a new CD-R to make it again.
How To Format CD-R or CD-RW on Windows 11/10
The process is similar in Windows 11/10 and earlier versions. Most tools for making CDs and DVDs have been taken away or hidden because they aren’t used very often anymore. The ability to format with a right click is still there, though.
- Insert the CD-RW into your disc drive and wait for Windows to recognize it.
- Right click the drive and select Format.
- Select either UDF 2.01, UDF 2.50 or UDF 2.60 as the File System.
- Select Start and then OK to confirm.
In Windows 11/10, you should be able to choose from all of these file systems. Each one works with most devices, but if you have newer hardware, you should use the newest one, 2.60. You can also use Windows 11/10’s Disk Management if you’d rather.
- Insert the disc and wait for Windows to populate it in Explorer.
- Right click the Windows Start button and select Disk Management.
- Select your disc drive and wait for it to populate the center pane.
- Right click the partition in the center and select Format.
- Select the file system and Start as above.
FAQs
Use the file browser on your computer to find the folder that goes with your disc drive. Most computers and PCs will have “D:” or “E:” written on it. Not only will the icon show you if it’s a CD or DVD, but it will also show you any special suffixes, like CD-R, CD-RW, DVD+R DL, etc.
The biggest difference between a CD-R and a CD-RW is that you can only record to a CD-R once, but you can record to a CD-RW more than once, just like a hard drive. But there are some other things that are different. The CD-RW can be used more than once because the laser optics are more precise.
A WAV file is the best source to use when making a music CD. (MP3s are always compressed from CD audio quality to some extent). When a 44.1 kHz WAV file is changed to a CDA file, there is no noise, distortion, or change in the sound.