Help Formatting!

Hi everybody,

Lately I've been having problems with newer games for my R4. So, I upgraded to the latest Firmware (1.23 -imported by the R4i team, and it's official FW, so don't say it's not).

However, since the original R4 1.18 FW and R4i 1.23 FW are drastically different, the card needs to be formatted before you update it.

However, I forgot to format it, and now the "Multimedia" button doesn't work at the main menu, and Kirby: Canvas Curse (U) hangs on a white screen, whereas before it worked fine.

My question is: what do I format the card to? FAT? FAT32? I want both Windows Vista and Ubuntu (Linux) to recognize it and be able to write to it; what's a good, R4-supported, universal format?
And the steps to format it are:

1.Backup all files (excluding moonshl, _system_, _DS_MENU.DAT, and _DS_MSHL.NDS).
2.Right-click (in Windows) and select "Format Volume" or something similar.
3.Select what to format it to, and click OK?

Are these steps (more or less) correct? If not, please tell me, since I want to get back to playing/listening to music/videos ASAP, and don't want to mess up my R4.

-WinRAR

 

Really? Because my MicroSD card came pre-formatted as FAT, which I assume is FAT16.

Oh well, I'll try FAT32, and if it doesn't work, then I'll try FAT(16).

BTW, does the R4i Firmware 1.23 work with Moonshell 2? What are the advantages of Moonshell 2 over the original Moonshell that comes with the r4?

EDIT 1: Windows Vista wastes space on anything you format with its header(s). I also have a pre-installed Toshiba SD Formatter, but it doesn't let you choose what to format it to. I read somewhere that there is a Panasonic SD Format application. Will it work properly on a SanDisk MicroSD card, or only Panasonic cards?

EDIT 2: Nvm the previous edit, for I cannot even find the option to format to FAT32, and Panasonic's format application still says the total size of the card is 1.82 GB, when really it is 2 GB.

I hate the complexity of Windows Vista... too bad there is no easy way to format in Ubuntu (Linux), either.
*sigh*

-WinRAR

 

*sigh....*

Well, in the end, I formatted it using Vista's built-in format... option.

Just a quick question: if I need to format the card again, will the max. size shrink in turn?

Thanks,
WinRAR