Format Hard Drive Win Pro 2000

[jackmann]

I am having a problem formatting the C: on Win Pro 2000 on a Dell Latitude C600 laptop. Error message says the drive is in use and do I want to unmount the drive. I select Y and nothing happens.

My goal is to create a multiboot laptop with Win Pro 2000 and Win98 operating systems.

Can anyone tell me how to format the C:?

Thanks in advance.

 

[vacunita]

How are you trying to Format the Drive? From Withing Windows 2000?

You'll need to go to bootdisks.com
and get a Win98 Bootdisk. Then use Fdisk to delete, and recreate the partitions. and Format them.

Remember Win98 cannot Read win200's NTFS partitions, so you'll need to format FAt32.



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Ignorance is not necessarily Bliss, case in point:
Unknown has caused an Unknown Error on Unknown and must be shutdown to prevent damage to Unknown.

 

[jackmann]

Thanks. The drive is formatted.

From what I understand, to load a dual boot with WinPro 2000 and Win98 I need to:
-partition both as FAT32
- load Win98 first
-change WinPro 2000 to NTSC after all is loaded for maximum funtionality

Does this sound correct?

 

[vacunita]

Yes.

"Format" is the operative word here. You can partition, a drive, but until you give it a format its useless. You need to Partition and Format in Fat32. If its Formatted already, what is it formatted in? NTFS or FAT32?

You you can format to NTFS before installing win2000. Win98 wont be able to see it, but Win2000 will be able to see the FAT32 formatted partition.

Gong back to your problem, you can't format a drive from within an operating system that resides on the drive you are trying to format.



----------------------------------
Ignorance is not necessarily Bliss, case in point:
Unknown has caused an Unknown Error on Unknown and must be shutdown to prevent damage to Unknown.

 

[jackmann]

I formatted it in Fat32. At least that is what I was trying for. I used format c: /fs:fat32

I believe that means the entire hard drive is formatted FAT32. There was only C: on the laptop. D: was CD-ROM.

 

[jackmann]

I'm having a problem formatting the new hard drive as a clean install for multiboot operating systems. Win98 has reset the format to Fat16. The only way I know to change this to Fat32 is to enable large disk support. Maybe there is a switch command. However, to make other operating systems work, this cannot be enabled.

Does anyone know how to change the format to Fat 32?

 

[electronicsfreak]

Make a windows 98 bootdisk from here. Then delete partiton, create a new one, then format.

http://www.bootdisk.com/

There is a point in wisdom and knowledge that when you reach it, you exceed what is considered possible - Jason Schoon

 

[wolluf]

jackmann - you seem to be leaving out the second partition (for 2k). If you just want standard dual 98/2k dual boot, this is what I'd do:-

Boot from 98 boot floppy, and run fdisk (with large drive support enabled). Remove any partitions there then create a new primary partition with enough space for your 98 installation. Reboot, format that partition and install 98 on it. Then boot from 2k install CD. When it asks where to install, create a second partition in the remaining space - this can be ntfs or fat32 - and install 2k onto that. When its finished you should get dual boot menu.

This isn't the most robust dual boot - as the o/s are not independent (they both use the same boot sector on C, but should work ok.