Date: Sun, 18 Apr 1999 17:23:25 +0300 (IDT)
From: Eli Zaretskii <eliz AT is DOT elta DOT co DOT il>
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To: Martin Str|mberg <ams AT ludd DOT luth DOT se>
cc: djgpp AT delorie DOT com
Subject: Re: FORMAT A: /U crashes BASH and Windows 98
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On 18 Apr 1999, Martin Str|mberg wrote:

> Incidentally, what does "FORMAT /U" do?

It formats unconditionally, that is, FORMAT doesn't check for a previous 
format, and doesn't try to save the information to undo any damage if the 
formatting goes awry.

Without /U, you lose bug time when the floppy is unformatted, since 
FORMAT gets Int 24h for every disk access and blindly retries the 
operation several times, which takes quite a while.