HDD mystery!

[largar]

I have 2 seagate barracuda 7200.7 stata drives (160GB),
mod# ST3160023AS, running on a Dell 5150. Actually I just installed the 2nd one recently after getting it used. The one I just installed came from a Dell that was running 2 of the same models in an array. When it was removed, it was not first deleteed from the array. I formatted it to one partition. It shows up on fdisk as 149.01GB.(same as the other HD). Now for the mystery! When using fdisk I get the following when I set the active partition; Disk #1=21514,(original HD) Disk#2=21514, Disk#3=10205 (New used HD). As you can see it shows up as 2 disks on one HD. These are not partitions. When I partition and install an OS, I get errors. Does anyone have any idea how to get rid of the Disk #3? I've tried everything I can think of, including low level format. Thanks. Appreciate any comments.

 

[wahnula]

There is a wonderful utility called DBAN:

http://dban.sourceforge.net/

Make a boot disk, install ONLY the drive you want nuked, and nuke away. One pass should do it.

A question: Why are you using fdisk? Are you installing Windows 98? If not, and you are installing XP or Vista, simply create the partition and format in setup. Unless, of course, I'm missing something, which would not be the first time.

Tony

Users helping Users...

 

[largar]

Well Wahnula, I tried fdisk when my xp install encountered problems, such as "found no disk" type errors. I've used "Seatools", "killdisk" and a few other methods to try and get this phantom disk off this hard drive. I believe it's presence is causing other errors I get when I try installs. I have not used "dban: but hey, I'll try anything once. Thnaks for your reply. I'll let you know results of dban.