Formating Hard Drive

  • Thread starter Thread starter Anna
  • Start date Start date
A

Anna

Here's a question I have. I want to do a complete reboot on my computer and
format my hard drive before I install Windows XP Pro. I have a 60GB hard
drive and what I need to know is if or can I partition the drive into 3
sections and make 2 NTFS and the last one FAT32. I'll make the first
partition 50% of the hard drive and the second one 49% and the last 1%, so
in future if I need to reboot and format again, I'll be able to use fdisk.
Will this work? Thanks

Anna
 
Sure that would work but why the 1% partition,to reinstall and reformat,simply
boot to xp cd,select install xp,new copy,the hd automatically gets reformatted the
new copy of xp on the partition.Why FAT32 on the other partition,FAT32 is an outdate
file system,if microsoft had its way,all file systems from the mfg would be in ntfs,a muc
more efficient way to go.
 
Hi,

1) Yes you can do this but....

2) It won't work like you are thinking

You can't use fdisk for anything but FAT/FAT32 partitions. It can delete
non-dos (NTFS) partitions, but that's about it (and even then is somewhat
limited when it comes to multiple volumes in extended partitions). Having
one small FAT32 partition is not going to make any difference.

The WinXP CD has the drive tools you need, just boot it and start the
installer. Delete the existing system partition, then repartition in the
preferred manner. Keep in mind also should you create any FAT32 partitions
that WinXP limits the size to 32GB. Frankly, you don't want to use fdisk
when working with an NT system.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers aka "Nutcase" MS-MVP - Windows
Windows isn't rocket science! That's my other hobby!

Associate Expert - WinXP - Expert Zone
 
I use fdisk because right now I have 2 partitions. One is NTFS and the other
is FAT32. I was lead to believe that if I made them both NFTS then when I
tried to use fdisk to reboot and format the hard drive it wouldn't work. I
don't use the WinXP CD to format my hard drive. I understand how fdisk works
and I know how to make the computer boot from cd. I just prefer to do it
this way. Extra work you may say. That's just me. I am running a Pentium II,
400mhz with 256+ ram, and 2 hard drives one 60gb and one 20gb. I use the
20gb for storage. I know, it's time to get a new computer. Thanks for your
replies and advise.

Anna
 
Hi Anna,

You can't use fdsik to format NTFS drives, regardless of whether or not
there are any FAT32 partitions. Fdisk is a Win9x partitioning tool, and
really has no place in an NT environment.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers aka "Nutcase" MS-MVP - Windows
Windows isn't rocket science! That's my other hobby!

Associate Expert - WinXP - Expert Zone
 
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