fdisk problem with new computer

[Guest]

I fdisked
I set up a C: drive
I formatted this
I then set up a D: drive
I split this into two logical dos drives
I did not format these

I then loaded win me onto C : drive

For reasons I wont go into
I decided to scrap everything and restart all over again

I FORMATTED c: [I know]

So what do I do now to wipe off D: drive and get ready to fdisk from fresh again

If I try to fdisk at mo

I get a flashing warning in dos

"Unable to access drive 1"

The problem is
if I go into fdisk again i cant load any of items

I just get flashing warning in dos

"unable to access drive 1"


To try and resolve this problem i reinstalled win me

within win me system information i can see

c: drive [25,65 gb

d: drive [17.32 gb]

where has other "logical drive gone with remaining 17.32 mb]

I am very confused

Ideally Id like to wipe my hard disk clean and start all over again



under fdisk options I have :
Fdisk options
current fixed disk drive : 1

choose ine of the following
1
2
3
4

Enter choices

Unable to access Drive 1. [ <<<Flashing ]

If i try and use any options
I get this:

current fixed drive 1

unable to access Drive 1 [<<<Flashing]

any ideas

btw i only have one hard drive


epox ep 8kha+ mobo
athlon xp 1900 cpu
ibm 60gxp 60 gb udma 100 hd
plex plexwriter 24/10/40a
asus v8200 t5 vid card
sb platinum sound card
768mb crucial pc2100 ddr

 

[Spdy_Gonzales]

I have never encountered the problem you say you are having, but let me make the following observations.

When you say 'I then set up a D: drive,' it would seem to me that what you actually did was create and extended dos partition with the remaing 50% of the drive.

If you indeed split the extended partition into two logical drives, then you would have a drive D: and a drive E:

If you can see the amount of allocated space on D: from within Windows, then you must have formatted the D: drive.

If FDISK recognizes that you have "Drive 1", then I can not understand the flashing warnings. The only time I remember seeing flashing warnings in FDISK is when I tried to remove a logical drive or the extended partition.

It might be that all you need to do is create the logical drive E: in the extended partition and then format it. Or if you just want one logical drive called D:, go back and remove the existing logical drive D: and then create a new logical drive D: equal to 100% of the extended partition.

I hope some of this might be helpful for you.




He's 31 this year. Last year he was 30
<i>David Coleman</i>

 

[jiffy]

Just a note, might not mean much. One time I was partitioning and setting them up, but didn't think I was doing it right, and didn't like what I saw. So I kept fdisk-ing over and over, until my mobo had enough and stop working. I believe what I learned was to finishes installing windows and not to piss of partition and fdisk.
I didn't quite get all you said, but to get back to fdisk. Boot from your CD, and cancel the format and get the C: up, type C: then type in fdisk, Delete everything, and check to see if anything is left, fool around until everything is deleted. Then you should be back to partition. Partition and extended partition. Or what ever you want to do. I mainly just wanted to share how I killed a mother board. Good Luck

defrage is child's play-fdisk

 

[Guest]

this is latest news on my fdisk problem

summary of events

I put togeather a new computer
I ran fdisk from a win 98 boot disk
I created the following partitions
c: [I formatted this]
d: [I did not format this]
and "another one"[I did not format this] [I call it "another one" for the reasons set out below]

I then installed win me
[only c: showed up as formatted /d: was unformatted/there was no sign of "another one"]
[at this stage I formatted d:through win me]

I loaded the drivers for my hardware etc

There was a problem just after this stage
I kept getting low memory warning

I decided to format C:
And reinstall win me

Before reinstalling win me
I ran fdisk again to check status of my partitions

after asking if I wanted largedisk support
I was unable to proceed further

under fdisk options I have

Fdisk options
current fixed disk drive : 1
choose ine of the following
1 blah bla etc
2 ditto
3 ditto
4 ditto

Enter choices

Unable to access Drive 1. [ <<<Flashing ]

If i try and use any options
I get this:

current fixed drive 1

unable to access Drive 1 [<<<Flashing

I then checked forums

Someone said try running
A:\Fdisk /mbr

I did this

But it didnt help

I then reinstalled win me
I havent installed any drivers
both c: and d: show up ok

during install I was asked if I wanted to proceed with "mbr [as noted also when running A:\Fdisk /mbr ]



So at this stage I still cannot run fdisk
I have c: with 25.5 gigs
I have d: with 17.5 gigs
Ive lost "another one with 17.5 gigs

Ive tried to run
partition magic 7

but I get a read error

Ice tried to run Ibm Drive finess test utility [http://www.storage.ibm.com/hdd/support/download.htm]
cant get it to load

someone suggested using wipeout[http://home.socal.rr.com/chansen/prog/wipeout.zip ]
I havent tried this

Some Notes

Is it possible I have too much memory for win me [750 megs]
I was aiming to use win xp eventually

quote:
Q: Too much memory in Windows 95/98/98SE/ME!


A: If your computer is running Windows 95/98/98SE or ME and it contains more than 512 megabytes of RAM, you may experience one or more of the following symptoms:
You may be unable to open an MS-DOS session (or command prompt) while Windows is running. Attempts to do so may generate the following error message:
There is not enough memory available to run this program.
Quit one or more programs, and then try again.

The computer may stop responding (hang) while Windows is starting, or halt and display the following error message:
Insufficient memory to initialize windows. Quit one or more memory-resident programs or remove unnecessary utilities from your Config.sys and Autoexec.bat files, and restart your computer.

The cause of the problem has to do with the Windows 32-bit protected-mode cache driver (Vcache). Vcache determines the maximum cache size based on the amount of RAM that is present when Windows starts. Vcache then reserves enough memory addresses to permit it to access a cache of the maximum size so that it can increase the cache to that size if needed. These addresses are allocated in a range of virtual addresses from 0xC0000000 through 0xFFFFFFFF (3 to 4 gigabytes) known as the system arena.

On computers with large amounts of RAM, the maximum cache size can be large enough that Vcache consumes all of the addresses in the system arena, leaving no virtual memory addresses available for other functions such as opening an MS-DOS prompt (which is supposed to create a new virtual machine).

End of quote

According to partition magic7 readme there is a known problem with win me and pm7 and fdisk

quote:

If you use PartitionMagic (or FDISK or any other partitioning
software), you should be aware of the following Microsoft warning.

IMPORTANT: You should not attempt to uninstall Windows Me if the
partition information for your hard disk or disks has changed since
you last installed Windows Me successfully. Windows Me creates a
backup copy of your partition information in the Suhdlog.dat file
at the end of a successful installation, and Uninstal.exe restores
the partition information listed in the Suhdlog.dat file to your
hard disk during the uninstall. If the partition information on
your hard disk or disks has changed since you last installed
successfully (specifically, since the Suhdlog.dat file was created),
then you might experience partial or complete data loss as a result
of attempting to uninstall Windows Me.



So there it is

sorry for such a long post

Any ideas

Thx

Urb

All I want to do is get my hard drive set up correctly

my sys

epox ep 8kha+ mobo
athlon xp 1900 cpu
ibm 60gxp 60 gb udma 100 hd [JUST ONE]
plex plexwriter 24/10/40a
asus v8200 ti500 vid card
sb platinum sound card
768mb crucial pc2100 ddr

 

[Spdy_Gonzales]

I am just guessing, but the one thing that stands out is the amount of memory. WindowsME will not run properly with more than 512 of memory. I suggest reducing your memory to 256, or 128 if you can. (you don't need more than 128 to run Win ME, but the maximum is 512)

After you reduce the memory, boot and run WinMe. Then quit WinMe and shutdown. Restart the computer with the boot floppy and see if you can now run FDISK. If you still can not run FDISK, then try using the IBM drive fitness utility (reboot necessary).

I hope decreasing the memory will solve the problem. Good Luck.

"If it weren't for the last minute, alot of things wouldn't get done"

 

[Guest]

problem sorted
Used IBM disk manager 2000
Loaded this on my other computer
Made a floppy disk
Ran it on my new computer
Set up hard drive as one partition

JOB DONE

Thanks for all help provided

Now should i go with win 98se or win me for initial os
May load win xp later

 

[Spdy_Gonzales]

If you already have WindowsME then I would go with that, or even Win98SE. I have not had any problems with WinME. Remember to keep the memory 512 or less.

I am holding off on WinXP until I feel I really need to upgrade. Spend some time in the Windows 98/ME/XP forum to get a sense of what the problems might be with WinXP.

"If it weren't for the last minute, alot of things wouldn't get done"