Reformatting HD

[Guest]

I have several partitions installed on a dynamic hard drive. My operating system is installed in
the first < active > partition. My windows 2000 pro is beginning to act up, so I would lik
to first reformat the "C: Drive" ( first Partition ) then reinstall windows from scratch. M
question is: Can I just reformat the "C: Drive" on a dynamic disk without affecting the rest of
the hard drive? Will the other partitions remain intact ( data stored )? Can I reformat and partition a dynamic drive in much the same way as a static drive? My first partition is
NTFS file system, also my second, all others are FAT 32. Do I use the reformat/partition utilities from the Windows 2000 CD? How do I use them? Are there other options? I wis
to reformat using NTFS on the primary partition

Thanks

 

[Benn Wolff]

dynamic disks are just that, not dynamic paritions.
you need to dig into how dynamic drives work some,

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/windows2000serv/maintain/optimi
ze/c10w2kad.mspx#XSLTsection123121120120

I have several partitions installed on a dynamic hard drive. My operating system is installed in
the first < active > partition. My windows 2000 pro is beginning to act up, so I would like
to first reformat the "C: Drive" ( first Partition ) then reinstall windows from scratch. My
question is: Can I just reformat the "C: Drive" on a dynamic disk without affecting the rest of
the hard drive? Will the other partitions remain intact ( data stored )?

Can I reformat and partition a dynamic drive in much the same way as a
static drive? My first partition is a

NTFS file system, also my second, all others are FAT 32. Do I use the

reformat/partition utilities from the Windows 2000 CD? How do I use them?
Are there other options? I wish

 

[Bjorn Landemoo]

Paul

Reformatting c: will most likely render the rest of your disk unreadable,
see this MS Knowledge Base article:

http://support.microsoft.com/?id=227364

If you have another partition that is hard linked (created before the disk
was upgraded to dynamic) you might be able to install Win2000 there, delete
all folders on c: from this new installation, and then reinstall Win2000 on
c:.

Best regards

Bjorn

 

[Phil Barila]

I have several partitions installed on a dynamic hard drive. My operating
system is installed in the first < active > partition. My windows 2000
pro is beginning to act up, so I would like to first reformat the "C:
Drive" ( first Partition ) then reinstall windows from scratch. My
question is: Can I just reformat the "C: Drive" on a dynamic disk without
affecting the rest of the hard drive? Will the other partitions remain
intact ( data stored )? Can I reformat and partition a dynamic drive
in much the same way as a static drive? My first partition is a NTFS file
system, also my second, all others are FAT 32. Do I use the
reformat/partition utilities from the Windows 2000 CD? How do I use them?
Are there other options? I wish to reformat using NTFS on the primary
partition.

What is behind this continuing fascination with multiple partitions? (not
you personally, I'm just amazed by the number of people who think that the
questionable benefit of having multiple partitions on a single drive is
worth the hassle. Multiple OS installations are the only really compelling
reason I can think of, but I try to avoid those when possible, and I mostly
succeed.

I've never tried to do what you want, but I'll suggest something that's
going to work very well, as long as you don't have failing hardware.

Copy all your data to a reliable alternative storage location. Boot from
the Windows CD. Delete *all* your partitions. Let Windows install itself
to the entire space available, NTFS format. Alternatively, if you really
need partitions, delete them all, then create new ones in text-mode setup as
needed. Other than the boot partition, you can save formatting them for
after setup is complete.

Copy your data back from the reliable alternative storage location. ;-)

Phil
--
Philip D. Barila Windows DDK MVP
Seagate Technology, LLC
(720) 684-1842
As if I need to say it: Not speaking for Seagate.
E-mail address is pointed at a domain squatter. Use reply-to instead.