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Thread ID: 16482 2002-03-09 23:02:00 No 'fat' Guest (0) Press F1
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38512 2002-03-09 23:02:00 I have picked up an older PC and decided to reformat and reinstall win98, however after I run the startup disk I get a message that win98 has detected that C: drive does not contain a valid FAT or FAT 32 partition. There are several possible causes.
1/ The drive may need to be partitioned & to partition the drive run FDISK from the DOS prompt.
2/ I may be using a third party disk partitioning software.
3/ some viruses can cause your C: drive not to register so use a virus scanning programme to check for viruses.
Problem 1/. Am unable to run FDISK, I get a message 'no fixed disks present'
Unable to reformat I get a message 'format not supported on drive C:' format terminated.
Unable to reinstall win98 'insufficient memory'
2/ I am not familiar with what is on the PC as to whether there is third party disk partitioning.
3/ Unable to run win98 from startup, advised of 'DISK BOOT FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK AND PRESS ENTER'.

So I am really stuck in DOS- Mode only and Would appreciate any help.
Guest (0)
38513 2002-03-09 23:41:00 I would first start looking at the hard drive. See if it gets detected in the BIOS. The settings maybe incorrect for the drive. It may not be connected.

Until you can get the drive present you will not be able to perform those DOS commands on the drive.

Once the drive is detected you can go about your normal fdisk and format.
Guest (0)
38514 2002-03-09 23:46:00 Start off, by booting up with the W98 startup disk in your 'a drive'

At the dos prompt, type, fdisk

Without going into to much detail, you need to delete unwanted partitions, and create one primary dos partition using all of your disk space, and make it active.

Then you have to reboot, and format that partition.(can only be done after reboot)

After you have formated, you will be ready to install Win98.

If you get lost or need more help on any of these steps, just post back, and help will be forthcoming.
Guest (0)
38515 2002-03-10 02:02:00 As well as making sure that the disk is correctly detected by the BIOS, check that any BIOS antivirus options are disabled. You could try FDISK /STATUS, to see what DOS sees. Guest (0)
38516 2002-03-10 03:36:00 Maybe its a SCSI drive? Guest (0)
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