How To Recover Files From An External Drive (Flash Drive, Memory Card) Showing Need Format Using PFM

Is your external drive (flash drive, memory card, external hard disk drive and etc), showing need format when you try to access the drive?


I have a solution for you but this solution to solve your external drive (flash drive, memory card, external hard disk drive and etc) showing need format when you try to open/access the drive will work if only the drive is not totally bad.

Things You Will Need:

  1. A computer system (Laptop, PC),
  2. The drive showing Format when you try to access it.
  3. If its a memory card, you will need a memory card ready.
  4. Partition Find and Mount Software/Application, Download it from here.

We will be using Partition Find and Mount software/application is an easy to use software that locates and mounts lost partitions in read-only mode, thus allowing you to safely access them with any file manager, including Windows Explorer. Partition Find and Mount finds lost or deleted partitions by scanning the storage device and looking for specific signatures that represent the beginning of a partition.

Note: Like as i said earlier, this process of solving External Drive (Flash Drive, Memory Card) showing Need Format using Partition Find and Mount software will not work if the file system on the lost partition is severely damaged or if the External Drive (Flash Drive, Memory Card) itself has a physical damage.

There are three different methods of scanning a drive Via Partition Find and Mount Software/Application:


  1. Fast intellectual scan
  2. Normal scan
  3. Thorough scan

Fast intellectual scan: works best if the drive is repartitioned or if MBR is the only structure that is damaged.
The specific of this method is the following: when a valid partition is found, the process automatically resumes from the end of the found partition. This greately improves the speed of the process. Scanning the whole hard drive using this method takes just seconds.

Normal Scan: in this option, Partition Find and Mount checks all areas of the disk where standard partitioning tools are allowed to place the beginning of a partition. An example of a standard partitioning tool is the Windows Disk Manager.

Thorough scan: will look into every sector of the drive while searching for valid partitions. This is the most complete method and it can take up to several hours to complete.

How To Recover Files From An External Drive (Flash Drive, Memory Card) Showing Format Using Partition Find and Mount (PFM):


Note: In this tutorial, i will be using FUJITSU MPF3102AT hard drive for illustration purpose.
  1. After successfully downloading and installing Partition Find and Mount software/application in your computer system (Laptop, PC).
  2.  Insert the External Drive (Flash Drive, Memory Card) showing Need Format when you try to access it and launch Partition Find and Mount software/application.
  3. When the device has been detected by the computer system (Laptop/PC), scan the drive by clicking the scan button and choose a scan option to use from fast intellectual scan, normal scan and thorough scan.  
  4. Wait till the scanning process is completed.  
  5. After Scan finishes, you will see the full list of found partitions. Now, you can add any found partition to the system by mounting and assigning a letter to it.  
  6. When you have successfully mount the volume, open your computer system (Laptop/PC) explorer
  7. Locate the volume you just mount via the drive letter you used.
  8. Copy the files from the drive to your computer system.
  9. When you have finished copying the files, you can then format the External Drive (Flash Drive, Memory Card) and copy back the files if you wish to do so.

Note: All partitions are mounted in the read-only mode. You won't be able to alter files on such partitions, but only to copy files off that partition. This guarantees that the data cannot be altered by the operating system or any software (including malware).

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