Reformat external hard drive - "bad superblock", "magic number wrong" error

i was just given a brand new 300GB USB hard drive, however, as it came NTFS-formatted, immediately after plugging it in for the first time, i fired up Disk Utility, and attempted to format it with UFS.
The problem arose when the progress bar just sat there for an hour at a constant 5%. Assuming the program had stalled (it hadn't...though it would have sat there indefinitely), i quit Disk Utility, opened it back up, and again attempted to format the drive--only this time, almost immediately the program output:
BAD SUPER BLOCK: MAGIC NUMBER WRONG
LOOK FOR ALTERNATE SUPERBLOCKS? yes
SEARCH FOR ALTERNATE SUPER-BLOCK FAILED. YOU MUST USE THE
-b OPTION TO FSCK TO SPECIFY THE LOCATION OF AN ALTERNATE
SUPER-BLOCK TO SUPPLY NEEDED INFORMATION; SEE fsck(8).
i opened up Terminal and tried manually to find an alternate superblock, to no avail.
fsck -b32 /dev/disk2s3
i've been unable to find any solutions to this issue online, but i'd really like to use my drive i've heard that this problem has to do with hardware that's about to fail, however, this is a brand new drive, and i'm quite certain the error is as a result of the aborted reformat operation.
Does anyone know how to remedy this? Thanks in advance.

Hello TheRedWino, and a warm welcome to the forums!
Hmmm, what kind of Case/Chipset does it have?
Have you tried erasing it with Zeros one Pass?
"Disk Utility
1. Insert the Mac OS X Install disc that came with your computer, then restart the computer while holding the C key.
2. When your computer finishes starting up from the disc, choose Disk Utility from the Installer menu. (In Mac OS X 10.4 or later, you must select your language first.)
Important: Do not click Continue in the first screen of the Installer. If you do, you must restart from the disc again to access Disk Utility.
3. Click the Erase tab.
4. Click the disclosure triangle to the left of the hard drive icon to display the names of your hard disk volumes and partitions.
5. Select your Mac OS X volume, then choose MacOS Extended Journalled, select the Partition tab.
6. Click Erase & look for Security Options. choose Zero 1 pass."
Formatting & Partitioning a Hard Drive in OS X - Tiger and Leopard...
http://www.kenstone.net/fcphomepage/partitioningtiger.html

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I get the following error when formatting a external hard drive. Partition failed with the error: POSIX reports: The operation couldn't be completed. Cannot allocate memory

I get the following error when formatting a external hard drive.
Partition failed with the error:
POSIX reports: The operation couldn’t be completed. Cannot allocate memory
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First, try a system reset. It cures many ills and it's quick, easy and harmless...
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Message was edited by: Kappy

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Gabriel_Tran wrote:
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[email protected]

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Reformat external hard drive - "bad superblock", "magic number wrong" error

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