zeroing out disk

[Theoyster]

I bought a used mac and when I erase the disk, afterwards it still shows 2 files and 2 folders on the disk taking up 40+mb of space. What is that? When you erase the disk isn't it supposed to be completely empty?

 

[DewGuy1999]

That's because the drive is formatted. Formatting takes up some space.

 

[Relentlos]

yeah no HDD is going to be the full 250, 300, 500 or 1TB of space listed. Formatting reserves a small portion for the file system information and stuff. A 2GB USB drive is the same, it won't be 2GB, it will be 1.98 GB or something.