[SOLVED] How to wipe PATA IDE hard drive? Pc won't boot from cd.

[Asdfggg]

I wanted to ask how to wipe an IDE hard drive. I got this program on a cd to let me wipe it, but when I make the boot sequence have cd drive first it says "Attempting to boot from cd drive... Failed."
When I try with another cd like a windows install disk, it doesn't work either, and I wanted to install windows nt4.0 after windows 98 because I have a dual cpu motherboard. The floppy won't boot either, it says "not valid system disk or disk error." I have booted from the cd drive and floppy drive before this motherboard. I know the ide cable works because I have windows 98 on a hdd on the same cable as the cd drive. And in windows 98 it detects the cd drive and floppy and shows it's contents. My motherboard is an MSI 694d Pro2, any ideas?

 

[drea.drechsler]

Unless discarding one with sensitive information on it you shouldn't need to wipe the PATA drive, just reformat and install the OS. You need to be able to boot to floppy or CD to do that though.

Problems with vintage systems are often mis-matched hardware or jumper settings slightly wrong. For instance: is the PATA drive the first drive on the chain or second? You'll probably be able to get better help on a vintage system thread...

***Vintage PC Technology Mega Discussion Thread***

Hello and welcome to the nostalgia tech mega thread! Have you ever been the owner of a 486? Or a Macintosh running System 7? Or know what the various cages that hold CD-ROM discs are for? Have you ever used a 1.44MB floppy drive? Or a punchcard? Or a 3DFX Voodoo 2? Well this is the place to...

forums.tomshardware.com