format partition as fat16 on mac osx

format partition as fat16 on mac osx 26/05/2007

just in case i forget, in order to partition a disk with a FAT16 partition:

diskutil partitionDisk /Volumes/NDS 1 MBRFormat "MS-DOS FAT16" "NDS" 1000M

that is:

* /Volumes/NDS: the mount point to partition, could also be /dev/disk1
* 1: the number of partitions
* MBRFormat: the partition format, MBR is the usual default for removable storage
* "MS-DOS FAT16": partition type
* "NDS": partition name
* 1000M: 1000 megabytes (size of the partition, if it is the last, it will span to the end of the drive)

12 comments
mac
2 years, 9 months ago (26/05/2007)

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Tom says

When I try to do this I get the error message "/Volumes/NDS does not appear to be a whole disk". Anyone know how to fix?

2 months ago (06/01/2010)

53porni says

john you to copy this in the terminal app from your mac

4 months ago (08/11/2009)

john says

i dont under stand this can you post atutorial

1 year, 1 month ago (05/02/2009)

Brandon says

Thanks!!! This was just what I needed to get a 1GB CompactFlash card to work on my old Canon S110 camera.

1 year, 3 months ago (03/12/2008)

Alli says

Hi, thanks for this, its dumb that disk utility doesn't just give you the option. =]

1 year, 6 months ago (22/08/2008)

Dan says

I was stuck trying to format my microSD into FAT-16 forever! After having looking into third party utilities to do it, since my disk utility automatically formatted anything 2GB and over into FAT-32, I had not been able to come up with anything decent. But it's nice to know the terminal command to get disk utility to finally do what I want it to. Thanks a bunch.

1 year, 10 months ago (19/04/2008)

KB says

I generally like my flash drives as FAT-16 rather than FAT-32 so I found this really helpful. Thanks for a great post!

2 years, 3 months ago (09/12/2007)

tommy tom says

Is this a command line thing? holy crap!

take a hint about all the typing to be done to enter this command.

PS: here's a helpful script that makes a brand new terminal window for you in the current path:

http://rsvp.atsites.de/stories/storyReader$120

2 years, 8 months ago (26/06/2007)

Adam says

Is this a command line thing, or can i do this in the disk utility app?

2 years, 9 months ago (16/06/2007)

Richard Stanley says

If you are going to format your SD card so you can transfer .nds files to you Nintendo DS. The "super card" only takes a FAT16 formatted SD card. I've been looking for the Terminal command, so thank you SO much.

2 years, 9 months ago (05/06/2007)

Alastair Tse says

I've got a device here that only takes FAT16 (not even FAT32) formatted removable SD cards. Sigh!

2 years, 9 months ago (27/05/2007)

Jared Kuolt says

diskutil is a fantastic tool.

But why in god's name would you ever need a FAT16 partition on a Mac?

2 years, 9 months ago (26/05/2007)

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