Hi Ken / Shenan,
Thanks for the replies and sorry for confusion i was trying to keep the
problem as short as possible and i am not that technical.
You're welcome. I understand that you are not that technical and how
that makes asking a question harder for you. But please do your best,
otherwise it's very difficult to try to help you. "As short as
possible" can often make your question impossible to understand.
FULL STORY
1 have Dell 3 pc's all networked, recently one Had a problem with one.
The problem unit was re-formated and the xp operating system re-loaded by a
"Technician" not me.
What was the problem and why did you have the technician do this?
Reinstalling Windows is almost always a very poor reaction to a
problem. And where did you get this "technician"? Many people who call
themselves "technicians" are completely incompetent. As a single
example of what I mean, "The Geek Squad" is a *terrible* source of any
kind of technical assistance.
I have two hard drives on this pc and always thought they were "C & D",
however he mentioned something about the drive being mirrored for backup
purposes and really the D drive was partitioned area of the C drive (all very
confusing).
The first thing you need to determine is how many physical drives you
have--one or two. There are several ways to do this, but one of the
easiest for you may be to simply open the case and look.
If you have one drive, let me try to make the terminology clear. It is
*not* correct that "the D drive was partitioned area of the C drive."
Note the following:
1. To partition a drive is to create one or more partitions on it.
Most drives have a single partition, called C:. If the drive is not
partitioned, it can't be used until at least one partition (C
is
created on it.
2. If you have a D: partition on your only drive, then you have two
partitions: C: and D: The D: partition is not a "partitioned area of
the C drive," it is a partitioned are of the same physical drive that
C: is a partitioned area of.
If on the other hand you have two physical drives, they each have a
single partition (not necessarily, but probably in your case). On one
drive, the partition is called C:, on the other it's (normally) called
D:
However if the second physical drive is to used to mirror the first
drive, you presumably have what's called RAID 1. If that's the case
the second drive doesn't get a drive letter and the mirroring happens
transparently to you.
RAID 1 (mirroring) is *not* a backup solution. RAID 1 uses two or more
drives, each a duplicate of the others, to provide redundancy, not
backup. It's used in situations (almost always within corporations,
not in homes) where any downtown can't be tolerated, because the way
it works is that if one drive fails the other takes over seamlessly.
Although some people thing of RAID 1 as a backup technique, that is
*not* what it is, since it's subject to simultaneous loss of the
original and the mirror to many of the most common dangers threatening
your data--severe power glitches, nearby lightning strikes, virus
attacks, theft of the computer, etc. Most companies that use RAID 1
also have a strong external backup plan in place.
I'll make another comment or two and ask another question or two
below, but I can't really help with your problem until I understand
what your situation is. Please read the above carefully, determine
what your configuration, is and report back.
ALL BELOW REFERS TO THE EXPLORER VIEW
The PC was re-networked applications loaded and is all working fine, all C
drives on all machines are shared to allow file sharing etc.
On the PC that had a problem we also need to share the "D" drive.
What do you have on the D: drive? Once again, if you have a D: drive,
you don't have a mirror.
On the C drive there is the usual little disc icon with a hand under to show
sharing, however the D drive icon is not the same.
The D drive has an icon that looks like a USB stick that is transmitting.
With the drive set for sharing same icon with hand under.
Are you seeing that from the computer the drive is on, or from other
computers on the network?
The only way to view the D drive on this PC from other is to go to "network
places" and then it all works fine.
I have noticed that if i try to map this drive with letter (as other PC "C"
drives are) that the D drive does not appear and cannot be mapped.
Are you trying to map it on the computer the drive is on, or on other
computers on the network? As I said in my earlier post, you can *not*
map it on the computer the drive is on.
The information i was after was to find out if it is possible to reset the
Icon / drive type for the D drive back to a normal drive, I assume when this
is done i will be able to map the drive.
As i say it all works fine its just an annoying problem as on the other PC's
the only way to this drive is through network places each time rather than
the drive showing directly on the file structure.
Hope that is better information
Dabbler
I assumed that the D drive was set for wireless
I don't know what you mean by that sentence. Please clarify. A drive
can *not* be "set for wireless."
