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I'd like to format...

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by mslaffsalot 2 views

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I have a "dead" computer that was given to me. I'm trying to start it w/floppy (won't do anything onit's own, no OS) whether I try to start it with or w/o CD I get the following error msg:

Preparing to start our computer.
This may take a few minutes. Please wait...

Windows 98 has detected that drive C does not contain a valid FAT or FAT32 partition. There are several Possible causes.

1. The drive may need to be partitioned. To create a partition on the drive, run FDISK from the MS-DOS command prompt.

I never geet the prompt back at the end of the error msg. Just a flashing curser that doesn't respond to the keyboard.

2. You may be using 3rd-party disk partitioning software. yadda, yadda, yadda...

I'm not and the previous owner never has used partitioning software.

3. Some viruses also cause your drive C to not register. You can use a virus scanning program to check your computer for viruses.

The previous owner said it worked fine until it chocked upgrading to win98 and then he tried to fdisk/format and never got it to work again.

I'd like to use it to practice networking w/a different OS on it, but I have to get it running to load an OS. Any tips?

Thanks, Tracey

15 replies

by mphoffar

My first suspect is that the fat32 conversion utility was ran, and it only made it half way through. I think you're best bet remove the old partitions (also look for non-dos partitions that may exist) then run fdisk again, choose N for large disk support and format it to fat 16. There is a lot of older controllers that will not support fat32. If you think this a vidus, you'll want to do a fdisk /mbr before recreateing the new partitions.

Good luck to you

Mark

by mslaffsalot

I don't get the prompt back after the error msg. It starts to try to load win98, then the error msg, then the flashing curser at the bottom that doesn't respond to the keyboard.

by fierygod

As with the previous answer, it sounds like the partition information, ot the MBR has gone bad. I can suggest two possible courses of action that I have used successfully in the past. Both require booting from a floppy to a dos prompt.

1. I havesuccessfully used a freeware partition manager that allows you better control over corrupt partition tables than FDISK, I've had more than one occasion where fdisk would balk at a drive, and this utility would let me dump bogus partion info. And since your drive is DOA already, its not as if you can go backwards very far. Anyway it is Ranish Partition Manager available to download at http://www.users.intercom.com/~ranish/part/

2. Failing that, if you can determine the HD maker & model, trythe manufacturers website, they likely have a utility available that will reinitialize the drive, this usually does domething like write 1's across the whole drive, which dumps partitions, MBR's, viruses, whatever. After that fdisk seems to do pretty good with the drive again.

by mslaffsalot

It was the Bios from the OEM that had me hung up. I ended up going to www,bootdisk.com and getting the UBD and using that and it worked. Everything was smooth after that. Thanks for your help.
Tracey

by marence

What's on the floppy that you are using to start up the PC? I've always had better luck with not using a Win9X startup disk, but going back to a standard DOS 6.22 boot disk with fdisk, format, and MSCDEX support added. If nothing else, this allows fdisking and formatting at FAT16. Then you can reformat to FAT32 with the CD and install Windows again.

by chrisl

You can always run fdisk /mbr and re-write the bootstrap. This will, of course, wax the partition. Reboot and re-run fdisk to setup a partition and start your new installation.

good luck.

by cdobbin

Do you have a win98 startup disk, if so boot of this disk and run fdisk. View the partition information and see what you have then delete it all, create your primary partition and set it active, then format c: and install your operating system. Problem solved.

by cdobbin

I re-read your question after I posted my answer, are you saying you can't even boot off a floppy????

by its a secret

It sounds as if your using a win98 se startup disk. You should get three choices.
1.start win98 setup.
2.start with cd rom support.
3.strat without cd rom support.
choose option 3
this should get you to the "a" prompt.
You should be able to run fdisk at this point.
I have run across something similar once. I ended up using a win95 startup disk to do my fdisk and format. Then I went to the win98 se . good luck

by its a secret

btw make sure the bios is identifying the drive as LBA mode. (this situation reminds me of a compressed drive)

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