Win XP format?

[animeal]

k, heres the "problem". :(
Upgraded from win ME to xp Pro. In setup it said it will format my c: drive or something like that in new installation. However, that didnt happen. I have just 7 or 10 programs running and that sucked up 13GB of my harddrive. want to format. Saw a few posts, however, didnt help. I dont have a maxtor. I just want to format my c: so I can clean install winXP again. I heard something about fdisk, but i have my doubts. Is there somehow I can do soething like in win98, where i can reboot in dos and format c:??
Or is there somethng eazier OR betteR?
Plz help
animeal
:t

[Midknyte]

the easiest thing to do would be to zap the drive and then boot from the xp cd. you can get zap here:

http://www.storage.ibm.com/hdd/support/download.htm#Zap

you just need to boot from a win98 startup disk. type zap 0 (0 is your first hard drive) and that's it. it takes just a couple of seconds. now you have a totally clean drive. :)

[Baddog]

I love my old windows 95 boot disk. Does the trick every time.



Baddog

[animeal]

Thanx, will try! Thought of using 98 bootdisk also, but neve tried it! :p

[AllGamer]

well during the XP install screen, there is a portion where it talks about the HDD Detection, and Formatting.

In those 2 screens, make sure you select the Manual method, and choose to Delete current partition, then Format, now you have a Clean NTFS drive.

Win Only XP in it, after the install finishes.

or yes you can use those crumpsy 3rd party tools and utilities for that.

FDisk is really easy to use once you get used to its ugly look.

and in your case what you only need is to Delete (option 3), the NTFS partition.

and Depending if you selected treat NTFS partion as a large drive or not, before it goes into the menu.

You will either see it listed as NTFS or a large huge extended drive.

in either case, just delete every single partion you see listed for that drive

and if you use option 4 or 5 if you have more than 1 drive, then in that screen you can confirm everything that you have done so far.

if everything has been deleted, then when you go to option #4 or #5 then it'll be just a blank screen, with nothing.

else you'll see some info as to the type of partion it has, formats, size, names, etc.


I can almost bet the first time you did not see the Formating - PARTITIONing screen during your first install, was cuz you were clicking NEXT NEXT NEXT NESTNEXT NEXT NEXT NESTNEXT NEXT NEXT NESTNEXT NEXT NEXT NESTNEXT NEXT NEXT NESTNEXT NEXT NEXT NESTNEXT NEXT NEXT NESTNEXT NEXT NEXT NESTNEXT NEXT NEXT NESTNEXT NEXT NEXT NESTNEXT NEXT NEXT NEST
Way too fast.

::D

[animeal]

Hmm, well, actually when I right click the c: drive in Program files, it says "Fat32". In setup it gave me an option to "upgrading" or something like that, to ntfs. Also, it showed my 1 partion that I use, and I tried to delete it, but it wont let me for some reason.... :(

[AllGamer]

Originally posted by animeal
Hmm, well, actually when I right click the c: drive in Program files, it says "Fat32". In setup it gave me an option to "upgrading" or something like that, to ntfs. Also, it showed my 1 partion that I use, and I tried to delete it, but it wont let me for some reason.... :(

Ok right now do you only want to Format, or only want to use NTFS?

if you only want to use NTFS then you can use

C:\>convert /?
Converts FAT volumes to NTFS.

CONVERT volume /FS:NTFS [/V]

volume Specifies the drive letter (followed by a colon),
mount point, or volume name.
/FS:NTFS Specifies that the volume to be converted to NTFS.
/V Specifies that Convert should be run in verbose mode.

C:\>

so you want to type
CONVERT C: /FS:NTFS /V

at the CMD screen.

then it'll tell you it will do it on the next reboot

else say you want to FORMAT, then boot from the CD, then during the HDD detection and verification screen,

make sure you find the option to Create / Delete partitions,

you only need to delete it, so during install it'll recreate everything on its own.

[animeal]

hmm,
right now i want to just format c:. However, in winXp setup I thnk it gives me an option to change to ntfs.
will try that.
thanx

[animeal]

1)Well, tried a boot disk and tryed to type "format c:". Didnt work, meaning, it wont even let me. It says something like "invalid command" or something of that sort . Dont know, woked fine on my laptop. :( So going to try something else that you guys mentioned here. :t


2)Also, before durin xp pro install, I tried to delete the 1 partion that they mentioned, however, they said it was in use by the setup files, so I couldnt do it.


3) Speaking of laptop. I have old 233mmx laptop. Split it into 2 partitions. One got win98 already running. Trying to install 95 for the other partion. HOWEVER, whenever I restart the laptop having already the CD inside, it doesnt want to detect it. I went into bios, but the only option it has is "C: and A:", no CD-rom option that I can configure. What do I need to do besides updating my bios perhaps? :( I really dont know how to do it. I have Phoenix Bios, searched for it, couldnt find it! :) Plz help!:(

[Midknyte]

is you C: drive ntfs? if so, then you'll have to go into fdisk and redo the partition. it's easier just to zap the whole thing and start clean.

as for the laptop, you'll have to use system commander or bootmagic to do a dual boot with win95 and 98. why do you want 95 anyway?

[animeal]

hi,
1) my c: drive on my desktop is FAT32 actually.
2) and on laptop, i ment to say win2000pro. but i already dled the bootmagic. It came also with fdisk. So with fdisk I created 2 partions, spliting them into exactly 2 pieces (Hd is about 2.3gb, so about 1.1 for each partion.) on partion 1 i have win 98 installed. Than configured bootmagic to place win98 in "slot1" so to speak. Now trying to dl the win2k to partion 2, which than i will add to "slot2" in bootmagic. Fdisk says that I cannot install 2nd OS while being in win, it says I need to install it while im in DOS.
:(

[AllGamer]

Originally posted by animeal
hi,
1) my c: drive on my desktop is FAT32 actually.
2) and on laptop, i ment to say win2000pro. but i already dled the bootmagic. It came also with fdisk. So with fdisk I created 2 partions, spliting them into exactly 2 pieces (Hd is about 2.3gb, so about 1.1 for each partion.) on partion 1 i have win 98 installed. Than configured bootmagic to place win98 in "slot1" so to speak. Now trying to dl the win2k to partion 2, which than i will add to "slot2" in bootmagic. Fdisk says that I cannot install 2nd OS while being in win, it says I need to install it while im in DOS.
:(

And that is very true.

what a mess....

Ok Don't use Bootmagic.

you need none of that stuff.

if i were you, i'll make a bootable disk from Win98 Add/Remove program

then use that disk to fix everything

boot from that disk, then do Fdisk
then delete both partition
then recreate both partition.
then reboot
then format to both
or just c:
then install 98 or ME
then install 2k or XP

[optic_pro1430]

Windows XP setup will not allow you to delete the partition or format the drive because you probably started setup from an older version of Windows, thus copying the temporary setup files to the Hard Disk and then restarting to start setup.

However, if you boot with the XP CD, (there should be a message, 'press any key to boot from CD') then this problem should not occur and will allow you to format the Hard Disk. :)

[animeal]

Got everything working now! formated both the laptop and the pc. Basiclly I just formated both hd drives, and than I did the win2k setup for laptop and xp for pc. Both times the setup asked me if I wanted to change the hd to ntfs , and I said yes. So everything works now!
thanx!
One more question:
Anybody by any chance can find NEC Versa 2780MT laptop manual PLEASE! I need to badly upgrade my 32mb of ram, and since I just uploaded win2k os, its REALLY SLOW. But I dont know how much should I upgrade :( I know that its a 66mhz bus, but thats it. Would a pc-100 laptop ram work on 66mhz bus laptop?
thanx
:confused: