Stuck in the Proccess of Formatting

If this concerns a software problem, please move it to 'software'.

I am trying to format a hard disk from disk Management. It is a WD5000BEVT, connected as a USB external disk, which showed as not initialized and unallocated.
It initialized ok it seems.
I started a full format to NTFS, changed the label, all other things being default in Format wizard. A quick look at WinDLG showed the disk passed SMART.
Well it reached 37% after about 90 minutes, then 38%; I thought this was slow so I left it it overnight. After 12 hours it was still stuck at 38%.

I plan to run WinDLG or HDTune Error Scan next, but the question is how do exit the format program / DiskManagement with no (or minimal) damage to the HDD ?

Dumb_Question
17.July.2015

HP Pavilion a405.uk / Celeron 2.53GHz / 1GB RAM /MS-6577 v3.1 m/b / Windows XP Home

 

Update:

OK so I was wrong - the format seems to be proceeding, several hours after my last post it has progressed to...39%

So the question now is still how do I stop it ? and, why is it proceeding so slowly ? at this rate it will be finished about 1-2 months from now !

Dumb_Question
17.July.2015

 

How do you have it connected, exactly?
That drive does not show a USB connection.
Is your XP 32 or 64 bit?

 

To clarify
Windows XP Home (32 bit)

The connection to the front USB port on the PC is made through a SATA<-> USB adapter, using the JMicron (standard) chip [I've forgotten the number] as is used in many external caddies/enclosures. The SATA connector on the disk is connected to one end of the adapter piece and there is a USB cable coming out that connects to the computer. In this particular case the power through the 15 pin SATA cable is supplied by an external PSU not from the USB port of the computer.
The identical set-up has been to test many disks and format a few in the past (I can't remember exactly what needed to done to any other WD5000BEVT models previously; there can't have been many though ).
Occasional problems are encountered due to faulty disks and faulty SATA/USB cables when I have used different ones; the current hardware seems fine (it worked as recently as yesterday morning [no format involved tho'])

Dumb_Question
17.july.2015

 

I would not stop it in the middle of the process - you may end up with a nice paperweight. Just let it finish.

I suspect it is taking so long because you are doing this through adapters instead of directly through a hard drive interface. Plus, it is XP, Celeron 2.53GHz and 1GB of RAM.

If me, when done, I would run chkdsk /r (note the space after chkdsk) on it. That too will take a long time but will verify all went well.

 

Thanks Digerati,
Your post confirmed my worst fears - I'll just have to wait it out and hope there is no power outage or other cause of a system reset (like automatic updates !)
I do not think it so slow because of hardware issues, I have formatted equally large disks (500GB) before with same hardware and they took a few hours, not a few months !!
Thanks for the tip on CHKDSK; I usually use /F

Dumb_Question
22.July.2015

 

If you enter chkdsk /? you will see /r "implies" or includes /f. That said, /r does take a little longer so not sure you want to do that on this drive!