How to Format a SATA HD in Windows 2000?

[Michel Merlin]

How to Format a SATA HD in Windows 2000?
~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-
On a desktop PC with W2KSP4 US (Athlon XP 2000+, 512MB, Maxtor
ATA133/PCI controller card, and Connectland "Silicon Image SiI
3112 SATARaid Controller" SATA-I/PCI controller cards, 3 IDE
racks accomodating in turn a dozen IDE HDs, Enermax
EG375AX-VE-W), I bought 2 SATA-II HDs (Hitachi T7K250,
http://www.hitachigst.com/hdd/support/t7k250/t7k250.htm , in the
250GB size, HDT722525DLA380).

When connecting one HD onto the SATA/PCI card (using good
shielded SATA cables), and booting in DOS using a Windows 98 SE
Starting Disk (completed, updated, and rewritten on a CD), I
FDISK-ed it (using the "more-than-64GB" version of FDISK). It
appeared with a very small capacity (something like 23GB IIRC).
I partitioned and formatted it anyway (just one "small" primary
active DOS partition so far).

But in rebooting in W2K, "Start > Settings > Control Panel >
Administrative Tools > Computer Management > Disk Management", I
get a dialog (best viewed in "Courier New" or "FixedSys" or
other Fixed-width font - may require copying into Notepad):
____________________________________________________________
| |
| Write Signature and Upgrade Disk Wizard |
|____________________________________________________________|
| |
| (Books Welcome to the Write Signature |
| icon) and Upgrade Disk Wizard. |
| |
| This wizard writes signatures on new disks, and |
| upgrades empty basic disks to dynamic disks. |
| |
| You can ............. |
| .......... restarting the computer. |
| |
| After you upgrade a disk, you cannot use earlier |
| versions of Windows on any volume on that disk. |
| |
| To continue, click Next. |
| ................ |
| | Next | | Cancel | |
|____________________________________________________________|

As you think I immediately decided to NOT apply that "Write
Signature" or that "Wizard". But when Canceling that
self-appointed Wizard, Disk Management shows me:

(red forbidden icon) Disk 1 |
Unknown | 232.88 GB
232.88 GB | Unallocated
Online |

Of course no partition is displayed - and accordingly in Windows
Explorer the HD doesn't show in any way.

I bought those HDs for backup purpose, I can accept to have them
unable to boot an OS, but I would prefer to avoid this
MS-paranoiac limitation. Anyway I need them quickly formatted
and in use. Can anyone help?

Paris, Mon 27 Mar 2006 17:22:30 +0200

 

[Dave Patrick]

These articles may help.

http://support.microsoft.com/?id=837160
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=305098

--

Regards,

Dave Patrick ....Please no email replies - reply in newsgroup.
Microsoft Certified Professional
Microsoft MVP [Windows]
http://www.microsoft.com/protect

:
| How to Format a SATA HD in Windows 2000?
| ~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-
| On a desktop PC with W2KSP4 US (Athlon XP 2000+, 512MB, Maxtor
| ATA133/PCI controller card, and Connectland "Silicon Image SiI
| 3112 SATARaid Controller" SATA-I/PCI controller cards, 3 IDE
| racks accomodating in turn a dozen IDE HDs, Enermax
| EG375AX-VE-W), I bought 2 SATA-II HDs (Hitachi T7K250,
| http://www.hitachigst.com/hdd/support/t7k250/t7k250.htm , in the
| 250GB size, HDT722525DLA380).
|
| When connecting one HD onto the SATA/PCI card (using good
| shielded SATA cables), and booting in DOS using a Windows 98 SE
| Starting Disk (completed, updated, and rewritten on a CD), I
| FDISK-ed it (using the "more-than-64GB" version of FDISK). It
| appeared with a very small capacity (something like 23GB IIRC).
| I partitioned and formatted it anyway (just one "small" primary
| active DOS partition so far).
|
| But in rebooting in W2K, "Start > Settings > Control Panel >
| Administrative Tools > Computer Management > Disk Management", I
| get a dialog (best viewed in "Courier New" or "FixedSys" or
| other Fixed-width font - may require copying into Notepad):
| ____________________________________________________________
| | |
| | Write Signature and Upgrade Disk Wizard |
| |____________________________________________________________|
| | |
| | (Books Welcome to the Write Signature |
| | icon) and Upgrade Disk Wizard. |
| | |
| | This wizard writes signatures on new disks, and |
| | upgrades empty basic disks to dynamic disks. |
| | |
| | You can ............. |
| | .......... restarting the computer. |
| | |
| | After you upgrade a disk, you cannot use earlier |
| | versions of Windows on any volume on that disk. |
| | |
| | To continue, click Next. |
| | ................ |
| | | Next | | Cancel | |
| |____________________________________________________________|
|
| As you think I immediately decided to NOT apply that "Write
| Signature" or that "Wizard". But when Canceling that
| self-appointed Wizard, Disk Management shows me:
|
| (red forbidden icon) Disk 1 |
| Unknown | 232.88 GB
| 232.88 GB | Unallocated
| Online |
|
| Of course no partition is displayed - and accordingly in Windows
| Explorer the HD doesn't show in any way.
|
| I bought those HDs for backup purpose, I can accept to have them
| unable to boot an OS, but I would prefer to avoid this
| MS-paranoiac limitation. Anyway I need them quickly formatted
| and in use. Can anyone help?
|
| Paris, Mon 27 Mar 2006 17:22:30 +0200
|

 

[DL]

You havent installed the sata drivers have you?
You usually have to perform a repair install, then use the F6 option to
install the drivers from floppy during the process

 

[DL]

PS and use disk management to partition / format not win98 fdisk

 

[Michel Merlin]

They didn't solved, but the 2nd one
( http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=305098 ) did help:

- In "Start > Run > RegEdit > HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE > SYSTEM >
CurrentControlSet > Services > atapi > Parameters", I created
a new "DWORD Value", named it "EnableBigLba", and Modified it
to "Value data:" = 1. However that new Value (that didn't
exist before) didn't change anything in the problem.
- By searching the "C:\" disk (where my Windows 2000 lives)
I found no "Atapi.sys" or "Update.inf".

Thanks for that idea anyway - and for any other one that might
help as well.

Paris, Mon 27 Mar 2006 19:03:45 +0200


----- Parent Message (links are clickable) -----
From: "Dave Patrick" <[email protected]>
Newsgroup:
news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.win2000.general
Message:
news://msnews.microsoft.com/[email protected]
Sent: Mon 27 Mar 2006 08:37:34 -0700 (Paris 17:37:34 +0200)
Subject: Re: How to Format a SATA HD in Windows 2000?

These articles may help.

http://support.microsoft.com/?id=837160
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=305098

--

Regards,

Dave Patrick ....Please no email replies - reply in newsgroup.
Microsoft Certified Professional
Microsoft MVP [Windows]
http://www.microsoft.com/protect


----- Parent Message (links are clickable) -----
From: "Michel Merlin" <[email protected]>
Newsgroup:
news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.win2000.general
Message:
news://msnews.microsoft.com/[email protected]
Sent: Mon 27 Mar 2006 17:22:30 +0200
Subject: How to Format a SATA HD in Windows 2000?

How to Format a SATA HD in Windows 2000?
~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-
On a desktop PC with W2KSP4 US...

 

[Michel Merlin]

I installed the (SATA) drivers that came with the SATA/PCI card,
then the next reboot caused MU (Microsoft Update) to propose an
update:

| Silicon Image Silicon Image SiI 3112 SATARaid Controller
| Silicon Image, Inc. - Storage -
| Silicon Image SiI 3112 SATARaid Controller
| Download size: 135 KB , less than 1 minute
| Silicon Image storage software update
| released on January 12 2006. Details...

After I accepted that update, in "Device Manager > SCSI and RAID
controllers > Silicon Image SiI 3112 SATARaid Controller >
Driver" I have:

Driver Provider: Silicon Image
Driver Date: Thu 12 Jan 06
Driver Version: 1.0.56.0
Digital Signer: Microsoft Windows Hardware Compatibility Publ
(must be the HCL, "Microsoft Windows
Hardware Compatibility Public List").

I didn't add any driver or apply any other file from Hitachi for
the HD itself however (I may run DFT 4.06 when I have time).

PS. I didn't develop everything (was long enough!) but Disk
Management, as implied by its "red forbidden icon" it had in
front of the "Disk 1" (as I reported in my initial post below, a
few lines after the "Write Signature and Upgrade Disk Wizard"),
didn't let me anything on that HD (no Partitioning, no
Formatting, nothing).

Paris, Mon 27 Mar 2006 19:04:10 +0200


----- Parent Message (links are clickable) -----
From: "DL" <[email protected]>
Newsgroup:
news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.win2000.general
Message:
news://msnews.microsoft.com/[email protected]
Sent: Mon 27 Mar 2006 17:09:17 +0100 (Paris 18:09:17 +0200)
Subject: Re: How to Format a SATA HD in Windows 2000?

PS and use disk management to partition / format not win98 fdisk


----- Parent Message (links are clickable) -----
From: "DL" <[email protected]>
Newsgroup:
news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.win2000.general
Message:
news://msnews.microsoft.com/[email protected]
Sent: Mon 27 Mar 2006 17:01:39 +0100 (Paris 18:01:39 +0200)
Subject: Re: How to Format a SATA HD in Windows 2000?

You havent installed the sata drivers have you?
You usually have to perform a repair install, then use the F6
option to install the drivers from floppy during the process


----- Parent Message (links are clickable) -----
From: "Michel Merlin" <[email protected]>
Newsgroup:
news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.win2000.general
Message:
news://msnews.microsoft.com/[email protected]
Sent: Mon 27 Mar 2006 17:22:30 +0200
Subject: How to Format a SATA HD in Windows 2000?

How to Format a SATA HD in Windows 2000?
~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-
On a desktop PC with W2KSP4 US (Athlon XP 2000+, 512MB, Maxtor
ATA133/PCI controller card, and Connectland "Silicon Image SiI
3112 SATARaid Controller" SATA-I/PCI controller cards, 3 IDE
racks accomodating in turn a dozen IDE HDs, Enermax
EG375AX-VE-W), I bought 2 SATA-II HDs (Hitachi T7K250,
http://www.hitachigst.com/hdd/support/t7k250/t7k250.htm , in the
250GB size, HDT722525DLA380).

When connecting one HD onto the SATA/PCI card (using good
shielded SATA cables), and booting in DOS using a Windows 98 SE
Starting Disk (completed, updated, and rewritten on a CD), I
FDISK-ed it (using the "more-than-64GB" version of FDISK). It
appeared with a very small capacity (something like 23GB IIRC).
I partitioned and formatted it anyway (just one "small" primary
active DOS partition so far).

But in rebooting in W2K, "Start > Settings > Control Panel >
Administrative Tools > Computer Management > Disk Management", I
get a dialog (best viewed in "Courier New" or "FixedSys" or
other Fixed-width font - may require copying into Notepad):
____________________________________________________________
| |
| Write Signature and Upgrade Disk Wizard |
|____________________________________________________________|
| |
| (Books Welcome to the Write Signature |
| icon) and Upgrade Disk Wizard. |
| |
| This wizard writes signatures on new disks, and |
| upgrades empty basic disks to dynamic disks. |
| |
| You can ............. |
| .......... restarting the computer. |
| |
| After you upgrade a disk, you cannot use earlier |
| versions of Windows on any volume on that disk. |
| |
| To continue, click Next. |
| ................ |
| | Next | | Cancel | |
|____________________________________________________________|

As you think I immediately decided to NOT apply that "Write
Signature" or that "Wizard". But when Canceling that
self-appointed Wizard, Disk Management shows me:

(red forbidden icon) Disk 1 |
Unknown | 232.88 GB
232.88 GB | Unallocated
Online |

Of course no partition is displayed - and accordingly in Windows
Explorer the HD doesn't show in any way.

I bought those HDs for backup purpose, I can accept to have them
unable to boot an OS, but I would prefer to avoid this
MS-paranoiac limitation. Anyway I need them quickly formatted
and in use. Can anyone help?

Paris, Mon 27 Mar 2006 17:22:30 +0200

 

[DL]

Personally I would never use winupdate for drivers, there has been too many
problems with drivers supplied this way. eg I know specifically that an Sil
update was corrupt and a Nvidea driver had the wrong version #
I would only use drivers from manu.web sites

 

[DL]

PS Not all sata cards are bootable, checking on the Connect web site I was
unable to find any info as to whether this card enables you to use it as a
boot device.

 

[Andy]

How to Format a SATA HD in Windows 2000?
~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-
On a desktop PC with W2KSP4 US (Athlon XP 2000+, 512MB, Maxtor
ATA133/PCI controller card, and Connectland "Silicon Image SiI
3112 SATARaid Controller" SATA-I/PCI controller cards, 3 IDE
racks accomodating in turn a dozen IDE HDs, Enermax
EG375AX-VE-W), I bought 2 SATA-II HDs (Hitachi T7K250,
http://www.hitachigst.com/hdd/support/t7k250/t7k250.htm , in the
250GB size, HDT722525DLA380).

When connecting one HD onto the SATA/PCI card (using good
shielded SATA cables), and booting in DOS using a Windows 98 SE
Starting Disk (completed, updated, and rewritten on a CD), I
FDISK-ed it (using the "more-than-64GB" version of FDISK). It
appeared with a very small capacity (something like 23GB IIRC).
I partitioned and formatted it anyway (just one "small" primary
active DOS partition so far).

But in rebooting in W2K, "Start > Settings > Control Panel >
Administrative Tools > Computer Management > Disk Management", I
get a dialog (best viewed in "Courier New" or "FixedSys" or
other Fixed-width font - may require copying into Notepad):
____________________________________________________________
| |
| Write Signature and Upgrade Disk Wizard |
|____________________________________________________________|
| |
| (Books Welcome to the Write Signature |
| icon) and Upgrade Disk Wizard. |
| |
| This wizard writes signatures on new disks, and |
| upgrades empty basic disks to dynamic disks. |
| |
| You can ............. |
| .......... restarting the computer. |
| |
| After you upgrade a disk, you cannot use earlier |
| versions of Windows on any volume on that disk. |
| |
| To continue, click Next. |
| ................ |
| | Next | | Cancel | |
|____________________________________________________________|

As you think I immediately decided to NOT apply that "Write
Signature" or that "Wizard". But when Canceling that
self-appointed Wizard, Disk Management shows me:

(red forbidden icon) Disk 1 |
Unknown | 232.88 GB
232.88 GB | Unallocated
Online |

Based on the above information, your Windows 2000 installation is
recognizing the entire drive. What you should do is let Write Disk
Signature write the signature. Then in Disk Management convert the
disk back to Basic. Then partition and format the drive.

 

[Michel Merlin]

I don't think general prattling is useful. Everyone (unless the
forums' "I-know-all", who haven't time left to try and learn)
knows, *by their own experience* or nearly, that MU very rarely
proposes updates to drivers, that those propositions are most
often (and contrarily to the most repeated fanatic rants) *more*
reliable and helpful than any other drivers (even from
manufacturers), that of course nevertheless it may happen (even
if rarely) that they are flawed (this happenned to me once in ~7
years of relying on WU/MU propositions on dozens PCs with 98,
98SE, 2K, XPH, XPP, in US or FR, desktops built completely
differently and notebooks from CLEVO, IBM, Compaq,
Fujitsu-Siemens, Uniwill), that manufacturers' drivers are
surprisingly better (and often more recent) when taken in the
product box than on their website, that ATA/PCI or SATA/PCI
cards' BIOSes *normally* make the HD+card bootable but that this
may fail, etc, etc, etc.

Oppositely I was reporting *facts* relevant to *the very case at
stake*. Thanks for doing alike.

Paris, Tue 28 Mar 2006 11:05:55 +0200


----- Parent Message (links are clickable) -----
From: "DL" <[email protected]>
Newsgroup: news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.win2000.general
Message: news://msnews.microsoft.com/%[email protected]
Sent: Mon 27 Mar 2006 19:46:21 +0100 (Paris 20:46:21 +0200)
Subject: Re: I had installed Silicon Image drivers
from initial CD then from MU (Microsoft Update)

PS Not all sata cards are bootable, checking on the Connect web
site I was unable to find any info as to whether this card
enables you to use it as a boot device.


----- Previous Message (links are clickable) -----
From: "DL" <[email protected]>
Newsgroup: news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.win2000.general
Message: news://msnews.microsoft.com/[email protected]
Sent: Mon 27 Mar 2006 19:43:17 +0100 (Paris 20:43:17 +0200)
Subject: Re: I had installed Silicon Image drivers
from initial CD then from MU (Microsoft Update)

Personally I would never use winupdate for drivers, there has
been too many problems with drivers supplied this way. eg I know
specifically that an Sil update was corrupt and a Nvidea driver
had the wrong version # I would only use drivers from manu.web
sites


----- Parent Message (links are clickable) -----
From: "Michel Merlin" <[email protected]>
Newsgroup: news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.win2000.general
Message: news://msnews.microsoft.com/%[email protected]
Sent: Mon 27 Mar 2006 19:04:10 +0200
Subject: I had installed Silicon Image drivers
from initial CD then from MU (Microsoft Update)

I installed the (SATA) drivers that came with the SATA/PCI card,
then the next reboot caused MU (Microsoft Update) to propose an
update:

| Silicon Image Silicon Image SiI 3112 SATARaid Controller
| Silicon Image, Inc. - Storage -
| Silicon Image SiI 3112 SATARaid Controller
| Download size: 135 KB , less than 1 minute
| Silicon Image storage software update
| released on January 12 2006. Details...

After I accepted that update, in "Device Manager > SCSI and RAID
controllers > Silicon Image SiI 3112 SATARaid Controller >
Driver" I have:

Driver Provider: Silicon Image
Driver Date: Thu 12 Jan 06
Driver Version: 1.0.56.0
Digital Signer: Microsoft Windows Hardware Compatibility Publ
(must be the HCL, "Microsoft Windows
Hardware Compatibility Public List").

I didn't add any driver or apply any other file from Hitachi for
the HD itself however (I may run DFT 4.06 when I have time).

PS. I didn't develop everything (was long enough!) but Disk
Management, as implied by its "red forbidden icon" it had in
front of the "Disk 1" (as I reported in my initial post below, a
few lines after the "Write Signature and Upgrade Disk Wizard"),
didn't let me anything on that HD (no Partitioning, no
Formatting, nothing).

Paris, Mon 27 Mar 2006 19:04:10 +0200


----- Parent Message (links are clickable) -----
From: "DL" <[email protected]>
Newsgroup: news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.win2000.general
Message: news://msnews.microsoft.com/[email protected]
Sent: Mon 27 Mar 2006 17:09:17 +0100 (Paris 18:09:17 +0200)
Subject: Re: How to Format a SATA HD in Windows 2000?

PS and use disk management to partition / format not win98 fdisk


----- Parent Message (links are clickable) -----
From: "DL" <[email protected]>
Newsgroup: news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.win2000.general
Message: news://msnews.microsoft.com/[email protected]
Sent: Mon 27 Mar 2006 17:01:39 +0100 (Paris 18:01:39 +0200)
Subject: Re: How to Format a SATA HD in Windows 2000?

You havent installed the sata drivers have you?
You usually have to perform a repair install, then use the F6
option to install the drivers from floppy during the process


----- Parent Message (links are clickable) -----
From: "Michel Merlin" <[email protected]>
Newsgroup: news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.win2000.general
Message: news://msnews.microsoft.com/[email protected]
Sent: Mon 27 Mar 2006 17:22:30 +0200
Subject: How to Format a SATA HD in Windows 2000?

How to Format a SATA HD in Windows 2000?
~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-
On a desktop PC with W2KSP4 US (Athlon XP 2000+, 512MB, Maxtor
ATA133/PCI controller card, and Connectland "Silicon Image SiI
3112 SATARaid Controller" SATA-I/PCI controller cards, 3 IDE
racks accomodating in turn a dozen IDE HDs, Enermax
EG375AX-VE-W), I bought 2 SATA-II HDs (Hitachi T7K250,
http://www.hitachigst.com/hdd/support/t7k250/t7k250.htm , in the
250GB size, HDT722525DLA380).

When connecting one HD onto the SATA/PCI card (using good
shielded SATA cables), and booting in DOS using a Windows 98 SE
Starting Disk (completed, updated, and rewritten on a CD), I
FDISK-ed it (using the "more-than-64GB" version of FDISK). It
appeared with a very small capacity (something like 23GB IIRC).
I partitioned and formatted it anyway (just one "small" primary
active DOS partition so far).

But in rebooting in W2K, "Start > Settings > Control Panel >
Administrative Tools > Computer Management > Disk Management", I
get a dialog (best viewed in "Courier New" or "FixedSys" or
other Fixed-width font - may require copying into Notepad):
____________________________________________________________
| |
| Write Signature and Upgrade Disk Wizard |
|____________________________________________________________|
| |
| (Books Welcome to the Write Signature |
| icon) and Upgrade Disk Wizard. |
| |
| This wizard writes signatures on new disks, and |
| upgrades empty basic disks to dynamic disks. |
| |
| You can ............. |
| .......... restarting the computer. |
| |
| After you upgrade a disk, you cannot use earlier |
| versions of Windows on any volume on that disk. |
| |
| To continue, click Next. |
| ................ |
| | Next | | Cancel | |
|____________________________________________________________|

As you think I immediately decided to NOT apply that "Write
Signature" or that "Wizard". But when Canceling that
self-appointed Wizard, Disk Management shows me:

(red forbidden icon) Disk 1 |
Unknown | 232.88 GB
232.88 GB | Unallocated
Online |

Of course no partition is displayed - and accordingly in Windows
Explorer the HD doesn't show in any way.

I bought those HDs for backup purpose, I can accept to have them
unable to boot an OS, but I would prefer to avoid this
MS-paranoiac limitation. Anyway I need them quickly formatted
and in use. Can anyone help?

Paris, Mon 27 Mar 2006 17:22:30 +0200

 

[DL]

cannot be bothered

I don't think general prattling is useful. Everyone (unless the
forums' "I-know-all", who haven't time left to try and learn)
knows, *by their own experience* or nearly, that MU very rarely
proposes updates to drivers, that those propositions are most
often (and contrarily to the most repeated fanatic rants) *more*
reliable and helpful than any other drivers (even from
manufacturers), that of course nevertheless it may happen (even
if rarely) that they are flawed (this happenned to me once in ~7
years of relying on WU/MU propositions on dozens PCs with 98,
98SE, 2K, XPH, XPP, in US or FR, desktops built completely
differently and notebooks from CLEVO, IBM, Compaq,
Fujitsu-Siemens, Uniwill), that manufacturers' drivers are
surprisingly better (and often more recent) when taken in the
product box than on their website, that ATA/PCI or SATA/PCI
cards' BIOSes *normally* make the HD+card bootable but that this
may fail, etc, etc, etc.

Oppositely I was reporting *facts* relevant to *the very case at
stake*. Thanks for doing alike.

Paris, Tue 28 Mar 2006 11:05:55 +0200


----- Parent Message (links are clickable) -----
From: "DL" <[email protected]>
Newsgroup: news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.win2000.general
Message: news://msnews.microsoft.com/%[email protected]
Sent: Mon 27 Mar 2006 19:46:21 +0100 (Paris 20:46:21 +0200)
Subject: Re: I had installed Silicon Image drivers
from initial CD then from MU (Microsoft Update)

PS Not all sata cards are bootable, checking on the Connect web
site I was unable to find any info as to whether this card
enables you to use it as a boot device.


----- Previous Message (links are clickable) -----
From: "DL" <[email protected]>
Newsgroup: news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.win2000.general
Message: news://msnews.microsoft.com/[email protected]
Sent: Mon 27 Mar 2006 19:43:17 +0100 (Paris 20:43:17 +0200)
Subject: Re: I had installed Silicon Image drivers
from initial CD then from MU (Microsoft Update)

Personally I would never use winupdate for drivers, there has
been too many problems with drivers supplied this way. eg I know
specifically that an Sil update was corrupt and a Nvidea driver
had the wrong version # I would only use drivers from manu.web
sites


----- Parent Message (links are clickable) -----
From: "Michel Merlin" <[email protected]>
Newsgroup: news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.win2000.general
Message: news://msnews.microsoft.com/%[email protected]
Sent: Mon 27 Mar 2006 19:04:10 +0200
Subject: I had installed Silicon Image drivers
from initial CD then from MU (Microsoft Update)

I installed the (SATA) drivers that came with the SATA/PCI card,
then the next reboot caused MU (Microsoft Update) to propose an
update:

| Silicon Image Silicon Image SiI 3112 SATARaid Controller
| Silicon Image, Inc. - Storage -
| Silicon Image SiI 3112 SATARaid Controller
| Download size: 135 KB , less than 1 minute
| Silicon Image storage software update
| released on January 12 2006. Details...

After I accepted that update, in "Device Manager > SCSI and RAID
controllers > Silicon Image SiI 3112 SATARaid Controller >
Driver" I have:

Driver Provider: Silicon Image
Driver Date: Thu 12 Jan 06
Driver Version: 1.0.56.0
Digital Signer: Microsoft Windows Hardware Compatibility Publ
(must be the HCL, "Microsoft Windows
Hardware Compatibility Public List").

I didn't add any driver or apply any other file from Hitachi for
the HD itself however (I may run DFT 4.06 when I have time).

PS. I didn't develop everything (was long enough!) but Disk
Management, as implied by its "red forbidden icon" it had in
front of the "Disk 1" (as I reported in my initial post below, a
few lines after the "Write Signature and Upgrade Disk Wizard"),
didn't let me anything on that HD (no Partitioning, no
Formatting, nothing).

Paris, Mon 27 Mar 2006 19:04:10 +0200


----- Parent Message (links are clickable) -----
From: "DL" <[email protected]>
Newsgroup: news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.win2000.general
Message: news://msnews.microsoft.com/[email protected]
Sent: Mon 27 Mar 2006 17:09:17 +0100 (Paris 18:09:17 +0200)
Subject: Re: How to Format a SATA HD in Windows 2000?

PS and use disk management to partition / format not win98 fdisk


----- Parent Message (links are clickable) -----
From: "DL" <[email protected]>
Newsgroup: news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.win2000.general
Message: news://msnews.microsoft.com/[email protected]
Sent: Mon 27 Mar 2006 17:01:39 +0100 (Paris 18:01:39 +0200)
Subject: Re: How to Format a SATA HD in Windows 2000?

You havent installed the sata drivers have you?
You usually have to perform a repair install, then use the F6
option to install the drivers from floppy during the process


----- Parent Message (links are clickable) -----
From: "Michel Merlin" <[email protected]>
Newsgroup: news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.win2000.general
Message: news://msnews.microsoft.com/[email protected]
Sent: Mon 27 Mar 2006 17:22:30 +0200
Subject: How to Format a SATA HD in Windows 2000?

How to Format a SATA HD in Windows 2000?
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On a desktop PC with W2KSP4 US (Athlon XP 2000+, 512MB, Maxtor
ATA133/PCI controller card, and Connectland "Silicon Image SiI
3112 SATARaid Controller" SATA-I/PCI controller cards, 3 IDE
racks accomodating in turn a dozen IDE HDs, Enermax
EG375AX-VE-W), I bought 2 SATA-II HDs (Hitachi T7K250,
http://www.hitachigst.com/hdd/support/t7k250/t7k250.htm , in the
250GB size, HDT722525DLA380).

When connecting one HD onto the SATA/PCI card (using good
shielded SATA cables), and booting in DOS using a Windows 98 SE
Starting Disk (completed, updated, and rewritten on a CD), I
FDISK-ed it (using the "more-than-64GB" version of FDISK). It
appeared with a very small capacity (something like 23GB IIRC).
I partitioned and formatted it anyway (just one "small" primary
active DOS partition so far).

But in rebooting in W2K, "Start > Settings > Control Panel >
Administrative Tools > Computer Management > Disk Management", I
get a dialog (best viewed in "Courier New" or "FixedSys" or
other Fixed-width font - may require copying into Notepad):
____________________________________________________________
| |
| Write Signature and Upgrade Disk Wizard |
|____________________________________________________________|
| |
| (Books Welcome to the Write Signature |
| icon) and Upgrade Disk Wizard. |
| |
| This wizard writes signatures on new disks, and |
| upgrades empty basic disks to dynamic disks. |
| |
| You can ............. |
| .......... restarting the computer. |
| |
| After you upgrade a disk, you cannot use earlier |
| versions of Windows on any volume on that disk. |
| |
| To continue, click Next. |
| ................ |
| | Next | | Cancel | |
|____________________________________________________________|

As you think I immediately decided to NOT apply that "Write
Signature" or that "Wizard". But when Canceling that
self-appointed Wizard, Disk Management shows me:

(red forbidden icon) Disk 1 |
Unknown | 232.88 GB
232.88 GB | Unallocated
Online |

Of course no partition is displayed - and accordingly in Windows
Explorer the HD doesn't show in any way.

I bought those HDs for backup purpose, I can accept to have them
unable to boot an OS, but I would prefer to avoid this
MS-paranoiac limitation. Anyway I need them quickly formatted
and in use. Can anyone help?

Paris, Mon 27 Mar 2006 17:22:30 +0200