Moved HD from Win98 system to WinME system...can't see it 1

[Guest_imported]

I previously had a PII 300 with a 8.4 gig HD partitioned into 4 partitions, and a 40 gig HD in one partition (all MP3's). I purchased a new 1.3 GHz Athlon with one 20 gig HD in one partition, a DVD and CDRW. The DVD and CDRW are on the secondary controller. It also came with a second CDRW that was connected to the primary controller along with HD (I won it to put in the old PC, but they installed it in the new PC). I removed this CDRW and everything still worked fine.

So, I have three HD's...a 8.4 gig, 20 gig, and 40 gig...referred as 8.4, 20, 40 respectivly from now on.

I wanted to take the 8.4 and install it temporarily in the new PC just to back it up onto the 20. Then, I want to install the 40 permanently.

So, I removed the 8.4 and set the jumper to slave, and installed it in the new PC. I powered up and the BIOS autodetected the new HD and ME booted up. If I go into the Device Manager, I can see both HD's there, and by double clicking on it, I see that the 20 gig HD is set to drive C, but when I look at the 8.4, the drive letter box is greyed out. I also can't see it using Windows Explorer. I shut everything down and installed the 40, and the same thing happened.

The only thing I haven't checked (and will tonight) is to make sure the 20's jumper is set to master, but I didn't consider this since the Bios and Device Manager saw the second drives.

Any more ideas?

 

[Comtech]

Both drives have primary DOS partitions that are "active".
Windows ME won't let you do it. Cheers,
Jim

http://members.cnx.net/reboot/

 

[Guest_imported]

So...does this mean I'm stuck with fdisking and losing all the data, or can I fix this so I can install the drives into the new machine?

If I can fix this without data loss, please let me know so I can proceed. Thanks.

P.S. If all else fails, I'll just network the two PC's together and dump all the data across the network...but that takes forever!!!

 

[Comtech]

You can run fdisk, but don't do anything to the drive. I'm not sure if you can "un-active" the partition, but I don't think so.
If at all possible, go back to win98 or SE, and you'll be able to use (and boot from) either drive.
Another option may be to transfer all the data off the drive using xxcopy (

http://www.xxcopy.com/xxcopy/xxcopy09.htm)

which will RETAIN the long filenames for you, then fdisk the drive. Cheers,
Jim

http://members.cnx.net/reboot/

 

[Knutsaq]

Win ME won't allow two HD with active DOS partitions?

How the heck are you supposed to migrate to that platform (not that you would ever want to)?

If you can't have two active partitions, how can you even use multiple HD? That's bizarre.

Microsoft is just giving you another reason to use Win2K.

Knutsaq.

 

[Comtech]

It's a definite fault of ME, no doubt about it.
ME well also NOT let you install it anywhere except Primary C: Cheers,
Jim

http://members.cnx.net/reboot/

 

[Guest_imported]

OK...I just got off the phone with the company I ordered the computer from. Since my ME package is still sealed up (so glad I didn't open it), they are allowing me to upgrade to Windows 2000 for $20.

So, my question now is...should I do this? Will my problem go away?

Any other problems I should be aware of with Windows 2000 before I upgrade?

Thanks for all your help, by the way.

-Don

 

[Comtech]

Win2k will "solve" your problem. It can handle (and actually use) up to 2 gigabytes of RAM, and HD's up to 100meg in size. It's got built in security, is easier to network, it's just a really nice OS.
Win2000 is a nice step up. It's a serious computer users OS, but you'll find it runs games just as well (if not better) than ME/95/98.
You'll probably never see a blue screen, but beware the hardware!
Read the HCL at

http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/Q131/3/03.asp

to make sure you're not going to have any serious troubles. You will probably have to hunt down a driver or two for win2k compatibility, but you can't beat the stability of win2k. Cheers,
Jim

http://members.cnx.net/reboot/

 

[Guest_imported]

Thanks for your help. I'm in the process of getting the upgrade...

Thanks again!!!

-Don