Uninstalling ME and installing Win 2000 Pro

[Brent]

I would like to completely uninstall windows ME and
install windows 2000 pro. I have encountered a data error
with FAT32 on Win ME that's causing problems. I would like
to completely wipe the disk clean and start over.

Q.1 Should I use FDISK and the FORMAT utilites to format
the drive to use NTFS before I install Win 2000 Pro?

Q.2 The HD is aprox. 40G. Would partitioning the disk be
a good idea?

Q. 3 I upgraded a NT 4.0 machine to win 2000 and the setup
froze during hardware detection. I had to physically
remove the internal modem and NIC card before the setup
would complete successfully. Are there any hardware issues
that I need to be aware of before I start the Win 2000 Pro
install on the Win ME machine?

 

[Bill Spears [MSFT]]

1. You can partition and format how you wish during the install of Windows
2000. Simply boot from the cd and go from there.
2. There is really no performance benefit or anything along those lines
with how you set up your partitions on the disk. It's more of a preference
of how you want it.
3. I would ensure that you have an up to date Bios.

 

[Daniel Chang [MSFT]]

Flattening the machine is certainly an option. You can certaining do the
steps outlined in your post. I'd just delete the partitions within the
setup program.
--
--
Daniel Chang
Server Setup Team

Search our Knowledge Base at http://support.microsoft.com/directory
Visit the Windows 2000 Homepage at
http://www.microsoft.com/windows2000/default.asp
See the Windows NT Homepage at http://www.microsoft.com/ntserver/

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[Guest]

Thanks Daniel and Bill for the reply. I've never updated a
BIOS before (Bios virgin). How would I go about that?

Thanks again,
Brent

 

[Dan Seur]

Brent - keep in mind that if your OS and all your data are in the same
partition, and if for any reason you must wipe that partition to fix an
OS problem, you'll lose your data (or have to scramble to back it up
somewhere else). This is a very good reason to isolate your important
data on a partition of its own, so that it remains untouched when the OS
partition disappears.

If you elect to put W2k in a partition of its own and the data
elsewhere, make that W2k partition 4-6GB if possible. That way it won't
fill up too quickly (or ever) with the many app files that may wind up
there.

If you want a quick hardware check of your machine's W2k compatibility.
put the W2k CD in, change to its \i386 directory, and run:

[CD]:\i386\winnt32.exe /checkupgradeonly

This will not install the OS, it will only check the hardware and some
software for possible W2k problems, and will give you a nicely formatted
report that includes suggestions. Very handy for discovering which
devices on the motherboard and elsewhere may need W2k-specific drivers
that are not included in the CD's library. You must run this in a 32-bit
environment; the 16-bit installer winnt.exe doesn't have the capability.