System did not boot after partitioning HD !! Please help...

[Guest_imported]

I just used "fdisk" to partition the existing HD into 2 partitions C and D and set C:\ as the active partitition. When I tried to install Win XP Pro , it failed to recognize any hard drives !! When I rebooted again , the system did not boot even from the DOS system floppy disk or the Win 98 SE bootdisk . The system froze at " Verifying DMI pool data...." . What happened ? Please advise what do next ....

My system : originally Win 98 SE, Celeron 466 , Mobo : Abit BE6-2

 

[Guest_imported]

_I checked on the BIOS and found the floppy drive A: was not activated ! Now I can boot from the bootdisk but in the BIOS, I did not see the HD being detected ! The option "Auto" was selected but there was no info on the HD at all ! Please advise ...

 

[paparazi]

After the partitioning did you format the partitions?
Because you need to. Martin Please let members know if there advice has helped any.

 

[Guest_imported]

I did not format the 2 partitions because I wanted Win XP Pro to do this job. The main problem is in the BIOS, I did not see any info on the HD or the 2 CD-Rom drives I had ...

I even formatted just drive D:\ to see if there would be any change . Still, no infos were shown in the BIOS under IDE .

The strange thing was that if I booted using the Win98 SE bootdisk, I could see the C:\ and D:\ drives . Please advise.

 

[Guest_imported]

Now the problem is can be described as :

_ The Bios (Award 6.0) failed to auto-detect all the HDs and CD-Rom drives in my system ( Celeron 466 ).

_ This problem arose after I repartitioned the HD ( originally under Win 98 SE ) into 2 drves C:\ and D:\ then reformatted them both to FAT32, ready to install win XP Pro.

** I uninstalled the HD and installed it in another PC ( Win98 SE, Celeron 900) , the Bios could auto-detect the HD easily !

Please advise how to fix this problem.

 

[paparazi]

XP does the whole thing anyway! So you could have left your original 98 installation, booted XP from the CDrom and followed the options to repartion/format etc
Start from scratch, delete partitions, repartition, make active, reformat all with boot 98 floppy then set first boot device as CDrom in bios, start PC with XP CDrom in the drive, XP should boot from the CDrom and give you the option to partion and format to NTFS and install XP.
Just follow the instructions.
Remember at this point your harddrive will be FAT 32 so reformat to NTFS prefered (more stable )
I know this is rather a long winded way about it but at least it should get you up and running. Martin Please let members know if there advice has helped any.

 

[Guest_imported]

Thanks Martin for the advice .

I followed your tips but could not boot from the CD-Rom. I did set CD-Rom drive as the first boot device in the BIOS. But the problem is that the BIOS can not auto-detect any HD or CD-Rom at all ! Please advise next step...

Thanks...

 

[ceh4702]

how does the boot 98 see the ntfs partitions or can a boot 98 remove ntfs(xp) partitions. XP may be writing something funny with the fat table and boot section of the drive. I know XP cab make multiple OS installs and has its own boot loader for multiple OS installations. This could cause problems. For this reason I suggest you try to boot from the XP cdrom. If you do not like my post feel free to point out your opinion or my errors.

 

[Guest_imported]

Thanks ceh4702 for the comments.
I cleared the CMOS and load the CMOS default fail-safe version. Now CMOS still cannot see the HD but it can detect the 2 CD-Roms . I can Boot from the CD-Rom , using the Win XP Pro disc. Howver , the setup was aborted as it could not see the HD !

So the main problem is : why the CMOS can not see the HD ?
If I boot with Win 98 SE boot disk, I can see the HD !

Please advise .Thanks,

 

[ceccoCSC]

The CMOS cannot see your HD? Where have you installed your hdd on the IDE channell or the Ultra ATA channell? I have a BE6 also and your hdd won't come out on Award BIOS if is phisically installed on the latter and XP won't see it because you have to load the updated HPT drivers for win 2000 and XP ("Press F6 if you need to load SCSI or other device drivers" this should be the phrase) during the very first part of the installation. If this is your case the easiest thing you can do is to move the hdd back to the ide channell (The cables are different as well), proceed with the installation, install all the updated drivers (especially the HPT ones) and then move the hdd to the Ultra Ata channel and set the bios boot option to external,c,a where external is Ultra ata (or dma).

Cheers