dos promt in 2000pro

[joeblack]

anyone know a quick way to get into dos from win2000pro as i need to format my hard drive ......... thanks

[Bigjakkstaffa]

YOur gonna hafta set the CDROM to first bootable device in the BIOS and boot from the 2k disc, there you can format it by starting a new nstallation of the OS

--Jakk

[Legg83]

Well the 'dosprompt' in windows2k can be reached by Start, Run, 'cmd', enter. But you can't or shouldn't rather, format the drive from there. If your windows2k cd is bootable, I would boot using that, and format from the command line there. I'm not sure the exact steps you would need to take to do that. I usually use a windows 98 se bootdisk/bootable cd to format my windows partitions. (I'm not sure if you can make it NTFS or not with the 98 cd) But I think that during the Windows 2k install, it'll convert it to ntfs for you if you want it to.

[Legg83]

I meant for that to go to 'dosprmpt in win2k'

[Legg83]

Well the 'dosprompt' in windows2k can be reached by Start, Run, 'cmd', enter. But you can't or shouldn't rather, format the drive from there. If your windows2k cd is bootable, I would boot using that, and format from the command line there. I'm not sure the exact steps you would need to take to do that. I usually use a windows 98 se bootdisk/bootable cd to format my windows partitions. (I'm not sure if you can make it NTFS or not with the 98 cd) But I think that during the Windows 2k install, it'll convert it to ntfs for you if you want it to.

[BipolarBill]

The only reason for formatting would be a virus. In any other case, just reinstall.

[joeblack]

thank u, formatting now

[Legg83]

ok that was weird... it showed up as a new thread, then moved to this post.

Its my opinion, but I always reformat if I'm going to reinstall windows. The reason I do that is for a clean install. I just feel better knowing that I have started from the ground up, and don't have any unneeded files lurking around my partition.

[Bigjakkstaffa]

I reformatt at least twice a year for cleanliness sake and when i upgrade mobo

Oh and BTWif your formatting a slave drive (ie a non OS drive) in win 2k it can be done from explorer as you would formatt a floppy disk, right click the drive, format voila, just FYI

--Jakk

[BipolarBill]

I merged the two threads.

In WinNT, when you reinstall, the old OD is ripped out ad the new one transplanted. Your odd data is saved. Formatting is massive overkill.