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| Thread ID: 108521 | 2010-04-01 03:56:00 | Can't Format! | B.M. (505) | Press F1 |
| Post ID | Timestamp | Content | User | ||
| 871691 | 2010-04-01 03:56:00 | A stupid question I guess, but I’ve got a computer here of a friends that’s so full of rubbish it’s start again time. He has all the disks so that is not a problem, therefore all I want to do is Format the C: drive. Done it quite a few times, but this computer has no Floppy Drive. No problems, I’ll boot from the XP installation disk and format from there. Oh no I won’t! :angry Even though I get to the format stage I get a message saying the installed Operating System is later than the one on the disk and format can’t continue! ???????????? Never struck that before, but his XP Pro Disk is SP1 so I suppose it thinks it’s SP2 or SP3 and therefore not the same OS. Got me licked, I can’t see the relevance because all I want to do is format the disk and install everything again. SP’s and all. I can boot from the CD drive but the BIOS doesn’t have the ability to boot from a USB port. Anybody know of a download, or the like, that can be burnt to a CD that will boot and format the HDD in NTFS? Surely I’m not the first to encounter this, so I guess there’s a few saying “Silly old Sod why didn’t he do ……..”? :groan: As always, all help appreciated. :thumbs::thanks |
B.M. (505) | ||
| 871692 | 2010-04-01 03:58:00 | does gparted do NTFS? If not I am sure UBCD4Win will do it. | nedkelly (9059) | ||
| 871693 | 2010-04-01 04:16:00 | You don't need to format it, Win setup will do that. All you need to do is nuke the current install. Use a gparted, UBCD, or any type of partition managing boot cd to delete the existing partition. Then boot with XP disk and let it do it's thing, it will create the new partition & format it NTFS (unless you tell it not to...) |
fred_fish (15241) | ||
| 871694 | 2010-04-01 04:28:00 | use diskpart, you can boot to the recovery console (XP disk) or use the support tools command line (Windows Vista or 7 disk) to invoke it, google "diskpart" for a list of the commands, its pretty straight forward, it is the only way I format my disks, it can do a secure erase too (with the clean all command) which will render the data on the disk unrecoverable (be carefull). | Deimos (5715) | ||
| 871695 | 2010-04-01 04:50:00 | Gparted does do NTFS | gary67 (56) | ||
| 871696 | 2010-04-01 04:55:00 | Pull The HDD out and put it into anothr PC (or external caddy) then format it. Because its not the boot drive you can format it from within Windows. | dzina (6860) | ||
| 871697 | 2010-04-01 05:04:00 | really? Thats a good piece of information to know. | nedkelly (9059) | ||
| 871698 | 2010-04-01 06:44:00 | Thanks guy’s everything underway. :thumbs: In the end I went with Fred. :thumbs: The moment he said “Nuke” the damn thing he had my attention. :D Anyway, I found an old UBCD that had an early version of Partition Magic on it so I told that to make me a new partition exactly the same as the old one. It advised it was going to “Nuke” what was in the existing Partition and I was overjoyed. I hit the keyboard with an open hand in my exuberance and problem solved. (no way did I want it to change its mind) ;) The XP installation disk is now chugging away formatting as I type. Thanks again to all who contributed, with a special thanks to Fred who suggested “Nuke the ……. Thing”. :thanks |
B.M. (505) | ||
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