Stuck on disk utility trying to format iMac

[ventuss]

I am about to format my new iMac SSD, but while in Disk Utility I have two options to format and don't know which one to choose. It looks like this...

[HDD picture] 500,28G GB APPLE SSD SMO512F MEDIA

[HDD picture] Macintosh HD


Do I have to format the top one and give it a name like Macintosh HD, or do I have to reformat the old Macintosh HD Partition?

 

[S.B.G]

I'm thinking both are the same thing. The top one is showing the drive and the bottom one is showing the partition.

You should be able to format the top one and it will erase everything and allow you to start fresh.

 

[ventuss]

It didn't let me go for the top option, maybe because I was in recovery. I went for the Macintosh HD lartition.

 

[Weaselboy]

It didn't let me go for the top option, maybe because I was in recovery. I went for the Macintosh HD lartition.

That is correct. If you want to erase from the top one to also wipe the recovery partition you would need to command-option-r boot to Internet Recovery and do it from there. But there really is no reason to do this.