Be aware that Microsoft use the term boot partition for the partition where
the operating system is installed, while the system partition is the first
primary active partition (where the boot sector and files required to start
the operating system reside) The system and boot partition can be
one-and-the-same.
In your case the system partition is the partition where you now have win9x
installed. You can format the partition then repair the boot sector from the
Windows 2000 recovery console. If you want the partition gone and Windows
2000 installed on the system partition then you'll need to do a clean
install.
To do a clean install, either boot the Windows 2000 install CD-Rom or setup
disks. The set of four install disks can be created from your Windows 2000
CD-Rom; change to the \bootdisk directory on the CD-Rom and execute
makeboot.exe (from dos) or makebt32.exe (from 32 bit) and follow the
prompts.
When you get to the point, delete the existing NTFS and or other partitions
found. After you delete the partition(s) abort the install, then again
restart the pc booting the CD-Rom or setup disks to avoid unexpected drive
letter assignments with your new install.
You can start the recovery console and from a command prompt issue the
command;
fixboot
to repair the bootsector.
To start the Recovery Console, start the computer from the Windows 2000
Setup CD or the Windows 2000 Setup floppy disks. If you do not have Setup
floppy disks and your computer cannot start from the Windows 2000 Setup CD,
use another Windows 2000-based computer to create the Setup floppy disks.
Press ENTER at the "Setup Notification" screen. Press R to repair a Windows
2000 installation, and then press C to use the Recovery Console. The
Recovery Console then prompts you for the administrator password. If you do
not have the correct password, Recovery Console does not allow access to the
computer. If an incorrect password is entered three times, the Recovery
Console quits and restarts the computer. Note If the registry is corrupted
or missing or no valid installations are found, the Recovery Console starts
in the root of the startup volume without requiring a password. You cannot
access any folders, but you can carry out commands such as chkdsk,
fixboot,and fixmbr for limited disk repairs. Once the password has been
validated, you have full access to the Recovery Console, but limited access
to the hard disk. You can only access the following folders on your
computer: %systemroot% and %windir%
--
Regards,
Dave Patrick ....Please no email replies - reply in newsgroup.
Microsoft Certified Professional
Microsoft MVP [Windows]
http://www.microsoft.com/protect
:
| OK I'm going to hold win2000 not going back to win98 since I just
| found
| out how to run DOS and windows 16 bit application.
|
| I installed Win2000 on two different directory (folders)
| one is on C:\windows - > Primary boot
| other is on f:\winnt - > Secondery boot
|
| The primary boot is on c:\windows and I want to get rid of booting
| from
| c:\windows. I want to have single boot from f:\winnt. But f:\winnt is
| a
| secondery boot that I want to make it as primary single boot so I
| don't
| have to use c:\windows. I have to motherbother setup of f:\winnt HD
| make as the primary drive.
|
| Now I can't use old DOS trick to delete c:\windows expecting it will
| boot from f:\winnt, and it wont'. Under f:\ root files and all I
| have is "pagefile.sys (read-only)". it does not work by moving all the
| root
| file in c:\ drive to f:\ drive. How do I make it as single boot from
| f:\winnt?
