Is formatting needed for macs?

[Blackjack07]

Hi,

I was wondering whether it is good to format your Mac (whatever model) every year or so. I have used PC's for quite a while, and during that time I formatted the internal drives almost every year. Does it really help for Macs to have a fresh format, or is it only bad?

I posted it here, because I wanted to hear some PRO's and CON's.

Thank you for your time!

B07

 

[smurfjammer]

I have never formated a drive (unless I was install a new OS on to a drive) and my iMac has been running every day for 4 years and no disc issues.
The only reason would be to take back some used space but the hassle of re-installing everything would put me off.

 

[jciapara]

It might be good for some people who might have a lot of files which they no longer need, and instead of trying to find all those files and delete them, they just format the drive. I've had my powerbook for 6 years now and I've never formatted my disc (A friend is still using it). I guess it comes down to whether you want to or not. I remebered when I used PCs, i needed to format every year or so as well.

Good Luck,

 

[bigdaddyp]

I have had to format before.

One time my young son got on imac when I went to the kitchen for a snack and deleted something. Not sure what he did or how he did it but it never ran correctly after that until I formated and reinstalled the os. I even used time machine and it fixed some of my errors but not all. Having come from the windows world it does seem strange at first not to have to reformat very often but the mac os does a pretty good job at house keeping. Assuming you keep my child away from your computer I doubt you will find very many reasons to do a format.

 

[aethelbert]

I format both systems at about the same frequency to regain speed, especially from memory page-out issues.

 

[brop52]

It's a complete waste of time unless you screw something up. Obviously it's easy to make a clone, format the internal, and clone it back but that requires very little time. Occasionally if the drive becomes heavily fragmented (due to low space) that can help. However if you are talking about reinstalling all of the applications that will take a lot longer. If you really run out of space the best thing is to get a new internal or put some things on an external.

 

[seb-opp]

its not necessary to reformat your drive to keep your mac running fast like it is with a PC. A simpler and less time consuming way to keep your Mac running fast is to get an app like MacJanitor to clean up log files.

 

[Sweetfeld28]

I usually only wipe my main OS drive when i have a new OS X update [meaning 10.2, 10.3, and so on]. Otherwise, i agree its really not worth the time, or hassle. Plus, now with Time Machine, its just to damn easy to restore a file, or restore your whole drive.