Formatting Partition

2006-08-09

If I have 1 hard drive partitioned into two drives and within windows i right click the drive and click format, will it format the whole disk or just that single partition?

thanks!
austin

infinity squared
endless possibilities

Codemonkey · 2006-08-13 #2

just the partition you right-clicked on.

MadDog 555 · 2006-08-13 #3

hmm, i tried and it says windows is using the disk, please close any windows displaying its contents. But i dont have anything but that open.

Is there another way to format it?

Codemonkey · 2006-08-13 #4

ahh, use the windows bootdisk and do it during the installation. Once you formatted you can simply stop the installation any time you want.

Or, create a dos disk which has format.exe. Or use fdisk and simply completely remove the partition and add it again (this is pretty advanced if you don't know much about formatting).

With a linux boot disk you should be able to do that as well, but I'm not familiar in that particular area.

You might be able to format the drive in windows safe mode with dosbox only (hit F8 during boot). Haven't tried that before...

MadDog 555 · 2006-08-13 #5

ok. thanks a lot!

very helpful.

MadDog 555 · 2006-08-13 #6

ok, formatted the disk, but the reason why i did is because i had windows vista beta 2 installed on it and i wanted to get it off. this was because the trial period was over.

anyways, its still is asking me when i boot up whether i want to boot up in vista or xp.

when i choose vista it now tells me that it cant find the files needed to do it.

but how would i get rid of this option?

thanks!

Codemonkey · 2006-08-14 #7

Yeah MS is still in the Master Boot Record (mbr) of your harddisk. I only used this to fix it for windows or when I want Linus removed from it, but try the command "fdisk /mbr".

MadDog 555 · 2006-08-14 #8

what will that do?

and do i type in the drive letter of the secondary partition first, because i sure dont want to lose all my data.

thanks!

Codemonkey · 2006-08-14 #9

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/69013/

MadDog 555 · 2006-08-14 #10

well crap.

i did what you said. i booted up in DOS and typed in this "fdisk /mbr" and it said fdisk is not a valid command, type 'help' for a list of commands.

so i did and the only on close to it was 'fixmbr'

so i typed that in and it said this:

**CAUTION**

This computer appears to have a non-standard or invalid master boot record.

FIXMBR may damage your partition tables if you proceed.

This could cause all the partitions on the current hard disk to become inaccessible.

If you are not having problems accessing your drive, do not continue.

Are you sure you want to write a new MBR?

so then i didnt know what to do so i just restarted without continuing.

It may be really hard to do this so if we cant do this i can live with the option, but it would be nice if i can get it off.

Codemonkey · 2006-08-14 #11

Another friend of mine just happened to have this same problem and I told him to backup his stuff before proceeding. I'll ask him tomorrow how it ended up for him...

MadDog 555 · 2006-08-14 #12

ok, thanks!

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	Codemonkey	2006-08-13 #2
	just the partition you right-clicked on.

	MadDog 555	2006-08-13 #3
	hmm, i tried and it says windows is using the disk, please close any windows displaying its contents. But i dont have anything but that open. Is there another way to format it?

	Codemonkey	2006-08-13 #4
	ahh, use the windows bootdisk and do it during the installation. Once you formatted you can simply stop the installation any time you want. Or, create a dos disk which has format.exe. Or use fdisk and simply completely remove the partition and add it again (this is pretty advanced if you don't know much about formatting). With a linux boot disk you should be able to do that as well, but I'm not familiar in that particular area. You might be able to format the drive in windows safe mode with dosbox only (hit F8 during boot). Haven't tried that before...

	MadDog 555	2006-08-13 #6
	ok, formatted the disk, but the reason why i did is because i had windows vista beta 2 installed on it and i wanted to get it off. this was because the trial period was over. anyways, its still is asking me when i boot up whether i want to boot up in vista or xp. when i choose vista it now tells me that it cant find the files needed to do it. but how would i get rid of this option? thanks!

	Codemonkey	2006-08-14 #7
	Yeah MS is still in the Master Boot Record (mbr) of your harddisk. I only used this to fix it for windows or when I want Linus removed from it, but try the command "fdisk /mbr".

	MadDog 555	2006-08-14 #8
	what will that do? and do i type in the drive letter of the secondary partition first, because i sure dont want to lose all my data. thanks!

	Codemonkey	2006-08-14 #9
	http://support.microsoft.com/kb/69013/

	MadDog 555	2006-08-14 #10
	well crap. i did what you said. i booted up in DOS and typed in this "fdisk /mbr" and it said fdisk is not a valid command, type 'help' for a list of commands. so i did and the only on close to it was 'fixmbr' so i typed that in and it said this: CAUTION This computer appears to have a non-standard or invalid master boot record. FIXMBR may damage your partition tables if you proceed. This could cause all the partitions on the current hard disk to become inaccessible. If you are not having problems accessing your drive, do not continue. Are you sure you want to write a new MBR? so then i didnt know what to do so i just restarted without continuing. It may be really hard to do this so if we cant do this i can live with the option, but it would be nice if i can get it off.

	Codemonkey	2006-08-14 #11
	Another friend of mine just happened to have this same problem and I told him to backup his stuff before proceeding. I'll ask him tomorrow how it ended up for him...