Hard Drive Partition

[Yvonne]

How do I tell if my hard drive has a partition?

I've also heard that there could be hidden partitions. Is this true?

If my hard drive is partitioned, can I reformat it without partitioning it?

 

[peter]

Under Control Panel/Administrative tools/computer management/disk management

It will show all of your HD and their partitions with the drive letters.
Manufacturers who sell systems with XP preinstalled usually have a "hidden"
recovery partition that holds a copy/image of the HD when you bought it.If
something goes wrong their manual describes how to use that "hidden"
recovery partition to bring your computer back to life.If you format this
partition you will lose that ability to recover.
If the company gave you an XP CD and a CD with all of the programs that they
sold to you with the machine by all means format away.

HD that are partitioned can be formatted without
repartitioning..........because you can only format one partition at a
time....
peter

 

[John R Weiss]

How do I tell if my hard drive has a partition?

Every HD that is formatted has at least 1 partition -- the primary partition on
which the OS, apps, and/or data are installed.

After that, there may be other partitions as well; usually these are Extended
partitions, and hold other "logical drives."

I've also heard that there could be hidden partitions. Is this true?

Yes. OEM computer mfgrs (e.g., Compaq, IBM) install recovery software and/or
BIOS setup information on proprietary partitions. These are hidden from normal
use.

If my hard drive is partitioned, can I reformat it without partitioning it?

Yes. Any partition can be reformatted.

However, if your real question is whether you can get rid of any hidden
partitions, the answer is also "Yes," but the procedure is different. In this
case, partitioning software such as DOS fdisk or Partition Magic (or the
Installation CD for some operating systems) must be used to delete all the old
partitions and create new ones.

 

[Yvonne]

I've gone into Disk Management and can't see any evidence of a partition,
even a hidden partition - presuming the hidden partition would show on the
disk management list as well.

So now, presuming that I don't have a partition, I can go ahead and
reformat. I have a Win XP Home Recovery SP 1 rebootable CD to restore the
OS. Correct?

 

[Guest]

are you sure you want to reformat the drive? or would it be better to
"repair" your windows instead?

 

[John R Weiss]

I've gone into Disk Management and can't see any evidence of a partition, even
a hidden partition - presuming the hidden partition would show on the disk
management list as well.

So now, presuming that I don't have a partition, I can go ahead and reformat.
I have a Win XP Home Recovery SP 1 rebootable CD to restore the OS. Correct?

By default, the Disk Manager shows a Primary Partition with a dark blue field at
the top of the drive depiction. Extended partitions will have green outlines
around them, and logical drives within them will have brighter blue backgrounds.

I don't know if all hidden partitions will show in Disk Manager. The "IBM
Service" partition on my laptop does show.

Yes, you can reformat, but make sure you back up any data you need first, AND
test that the CD is bootable. Also, it would be a good idea to download SP2 and
save it to a CD before you reformat, so you can install SP2 immediately after
installing XP and before connecting to the Internet.

When you re-install XP, it is a good time to decide whether you want to
partition your HD. If you do, you can use the utilities in the XP Install menu
to delete all current partitions and create new ones. You can start with the
Primary partition on which C: will be formatted and XP will be installed; 20-30
GB is plenty. Then create an Extended partition in Disk Manager later, and
format the partition as you wish.

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

How do I tell if my hard drive has a partition?

It does. If it didn't, you wouldn't be able to use it.A drive can't be used
until it has it least one partition on it. To partition a drive is to create
one or more partitions on it.

If you want to know whether you have more than one partition, you should be
able to see all your partitions (except hidden ones) in My Computer or
Windows Explorer. You will very likely see a partition called C: there, and
you may also see others.

I've also heard that there could be hidden partitions. Is this true?

Yes. These are sometimes created by the larger OEMs; they put an image of
Windows there, so you can restore from it if your original installation gets
damaged. They do this instead of providing you a CD. It's very poor
practice, as far as I'm concerned, since it leaves you up the creek without
a paddle if the drive itself fails. Personally I want an installation CD for
every computer I have running Windows, and would never choose to buy a
computer that came with Windows preinstalled and just a hidden recovery
partition.

If my hard drive is partitioned, can I reformat it without
partitioning it?

Again, your hard drive *is* partitioned. You actually format a partition,
not the drive itself. You can reformat any or all of the partitions it has,
if there are multiple, or the only partition, if there is just one.

Alternatively if you want to start completely from scratch, you can
repartition (creating one or more partitions) *and* format each partition
you create. Normally the only reason to do this is if you want to change the
existing partition structure.

 

[Yvonne]

The reason I choose to reformat is to get rid of all the junk files left
behind after I've removed quite a few programs over time. Along the way, a
unauthorized version of an anti-virus program was downloaded. Someone tried
to get rid of it but it didn't work - it is still trying to run in Outlook
and is generating so many errors it isn't worth it. Not only that, someone
went into the registry and tried to clean up a bunch of the files in order
to get rid of all the old programs and the unwanted anti-virus program.
Needless to say, there are errors are all over the place. Better to redo it
and have a fresh start.

 

[Yvonne]

thank you - I just have a dark blue line for the primary partition - there
is no other colours for the rest of the list (all USB drives that are not
active right now)

also thanks for the point on the SP2. I had not thought about downloading
it before I reformat at all.

 

[Yvonne]

So Ken, what I'm reading on your post is that if I have a recovery disk and
I want to start from scratch, I can't do it because I don't have the entire
Windows XP Home program?

I just posted the reason why I wanted to do a complete reformat (starting
with a clean slate) under this same topic. Do you see any reason there that
would indicate it would be better for me to "repair Windows" than to go to
all the trouble of reformatting the entire drive?

I had thought of using the System Restore but the help files says that there
are only approx 3 weeks or so of information there. The computer is used
everyday and the programs and registry deletion/amendments took place over
an extended period of time - definitely longer than 3 weeks - more like the
over the last year.

 

[peter]

Recovery disks work in two different ways depending upon the manufacturer
most will wipe(format) the drive which erases everything and then install
whatever is on the disk...the operating system definitly..other programs
that where there when you purchased the machine maybe
Any other disks that came with the machine??
Do you have disks of the programs that you installed on the machine? you
will need to reinstall what you want
Do you have a drivers disk to install the sound/video/etc drivers that are
on your machine??
These can be downloaded from the manufacturer's website doing a search by
model number
peter

--
"Those are my principles. If you don't like them I have others."

So Ken, what I'm reading on your post is that if I have a recovery disk
and I want to start from scratch, I can't do it because I don't have the
entire Windows XP Home program?

I just posted the reason why I wanted to do a complete reformat (starting
with a clean slate) under this same topic. Do you see any reason there
that would indicate it would be better for me to "repair Windows" than to
go to all the trouble of reformatting the entire drive?

I had thought of using the System Restore but the help files says that
there are only approx 3 weeks or so of information there. The computer is
used everyday and the programs and registry deletion/amendments took place
over an extended period of time - definitely longer than 3 weeks - more
like the over the last year.

 

[Yvonne]

Hi Peter, Ken and John,

Thank you for your patience in this - I'm trying to learn something
completely new to me.

I believe I can download the drivers for the motherboard (INF, USB),
Network/Sound/Video Card and a BIOS update from Seanix by entering in the
serial # of my system. I presume that these are what you are talking about
Peter?

Will any of the system devices be affected by a reformat (a complete
wipe-out of the hard drive)? Eg: the MS Management BIOS Driver, Intel(R)
82801EB LPC Interface Controller - 24D0, Intel(R) 82865G/PE/P Processor to
IO Controller - 2570, System CMOS, PCI Bus?

I don't know if this will help any, but I thought that perhaps it might help
if I make a list of what I have / don't have for software and details of my
system.

Here's what I have in my possession at the moment:

1. Seanix Win XP Home Recovery CD SP1
2. LG BHA (B's Recorder Gold/B's Clip/neo DVD/DVD RAM Driver/Acrobat
Reader) - not sure if I need this CD or not
3. Cyberlink Power DVD XP (not sure if I need this CD or not)
4. Software for installation of my cable internet connection and modem
5. Misc software for things like webcam, Word, my printer

My monitor is an LCD plug and play Extreme monitor
HID-compliant Microsoft Optical mouse (no software)
MS PS/2 Keyboard (Intellitype Pro) (no software)
3.5 Floppy Drive (no software)
Logitech QuickCam Pro 4000 (plus software)
I have a Zip 250 drive and associated software
An internal US Robotics v.92 Fax Win Int modem (which I no longer use)

Other details:

4 frontal USB drives
ACPI Multiprocessor PC
Display Adapter: Intel(R) 82865G Graphics Controller
HL-DT-ST DVDRAM GSA-4040B
USB Human Interface Device
Intel(R) 82801EB Ultra ATA Storage Controllers
Primary and secondary IDE Channel
Network Adaptor is: Intel(R) PRO/100 VE Network Connection located in: PCI
Slot 2 (PCI bus 1, device 8, function 0)
COM 1 & 2 and LPT 1
Processor is: Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 3.00GHz

Under the sound-video-game controllers is listed Realtek AC-97 Audio. Also
listed are things like Audio and Video Codecs, MDU-401 Compatible MIDI
Device (located on Intel(R) 82801EB LPC Interface Controller - 24D0),
Standard Game Port, Media Control Devices, Legacy Audio Driver, Legacy Video
Capture Devices (WDM Video for Windows Capture Driver (Win32)).

I think that's everything. Am I missing anything?

Yvonne

Recovery disks work in two different ways depending upon the manufacturer
most will wipe(format) the drive which erases everything and then install
whatever is on the disk...the operating system definitly..other programs
that where there when you purchased the machine maybe
Any other disks that came with the machine??
Do you have disks of the programs that you installed on the machine? you
will need to reinstall what you want
Do you have a drivers disk to install the sound/video/etc drivers that are
on your machine??
These can be downloaded from the manufacturer's website doing a search by
model number
peter

 

[Ricky]

I would also look around the Seanix website..you may find the steps needed
to reformat you computer and what you need to do it.

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

So Ken, what I'm reading on your post is that if I have a recovery
disk and I want to start from scratch, I can't do it because I don't
have the entire Windows XP Home program?

No,I didn't mean that at all. I'm not sure where you got that idea from my
message, but if I somehow conveyed that, my apologies.

Your recovery disk will work, as will a hidden recovery partition. I
wouldn't choose to buy a machine that came only with only one of those,
because they have limitations that I'm not willing to accept. But if you
have them, they work.

I just posted the reason why I wanted to do a complete reformat
(starting with a clean slate) under this same topic. Do you see any
reason there that would indicate it would be better for me to "repair
Windows" than to go to all the trouble of reformatting the entire
drive?

I don't know exactly what you mean when you say "repair Windows," but I am
almost always against reinstallation except as a last resort. I wouldn't do
it just to "get rid of all the junk files left behind" after uninstalling
programs. However in your case, if someone has been fooling with the
registry unsuccessfully, you don't know exactly what he's done, and you are
experiencing "errors are all over the place," reinstalling may be your best
course.

I had thought of using the System Restore but the help files says
that there are only approx 3 weeks or so of information there. The
computer is used everyday and the programs and registry
deletion/amendments took place over an extended period of time -
definitely longer than 3 weeks - more like the over the last year.

System Restore is normally useful only to go back a week or so at most.
Three weeks is plenty. Beyond that if you try to restore, you usually end
up getting lots of things out of synch with each other. And remember that
System Restore restores the operating system *only*.

 

[John R Weiss]

Hi Peter, Ken and John,

Thank you for your patience in this - I'm trying to learn something completely
new to me.

I believe I can download the drivers for the motherboard (INF, USB),
Network/Sound/Video Card and a BIOS update from Seanix by entering in the
serial # of my system. I presume that these are what you are talking about
Peter?

Will any of the system devices be affected by a reformat (a complete wipe-out
of the hard drive)? Eg: the MS Management BIOS Driver, Intel(R) 82801EB LPC
Interface Controller - 24D0, Intel(R) 82865G/PE/P Processor to IO Controller -
2570, System CMOS, PCI Bus?

I don't know if this will help any, but I thought that perhaps it might help
if I make a list of what I have / don't have for software and details of my
system.

Here's what I have in my possession at the moment:

1. Seanix Win XP Home Recovery CD SP1

This should have all the necessary OEM drivers on it for your machine. You can
go to their web site later and see if they have any updates, but it appears the
mfgr uses a recovery CD instead of a recovery partition on the computer -- a
common practice.

2. LG BHA (B's Recorder Gold/B's Clip/neo DVD/DVD RAM Driver/Acrobat
Reader) - not sure if I need this CD or not
3. Cyberlink Power DVD XP (not sure if I need this CD or not)
4. Software for installation of my cable internet connection and modem
5. Misc software for things like webcam, Word, my printer

You will probably need to install the CD/DVD software to regain full
burn/rewrite functionality of your CD/DVD.

Other details: . . .

I think that's everything. Am I missing anything?

All the rest of those devices will likely be loaded by the recovery CD. Most
are standard stuff, and have drivers available in XP already.

Other than the SP2 CD, you should have everything you need to get back on line
and download all the security updates. Make sure SP2 is the first thing you do
after installing XP.

 

[peter]

Like John said..judging by your list XP will have those drivers.
All other programs will need installing.
So to sum up.........
Go online and download SP2 and burn it to a CD......then start your
reinstall process
disconnect from the net......physically unplug
insert the Recovery CD and start system
let it format the HD and then install XP as a new install
Check to make sure it all works.......do not connect to the NET
Install SP2............check to make sure it works
install anti virus.............firewall if you have it
Now install that driver/software package from your Internet Provider and re
setup your account..dont forget email
Then connect to the net and update your Seanix drivers first
Restart and check
Then connect to XP update and install updates.........high priority only
hardware updates should be downloaded from manufacturers website
Then reinstall all of your software and saved files
good luck
you know where to find us
peter

 

[Yvonne]

wonderful - - thanks Peter, John, Ken, Ricky - you've been a big help ...
now hopefully all goes well !!

Yvonne

 

[Ricky]

You're welcome and good luck.

wonderful - - thanks Peter, John, Ken, Ricky - you've been a big help ...
now hopefully all goes well !!

Yvonne