XP H/D Format

[chesjak]

Hi
I have got two H/Drives.
One is a 500Gb drive the other is 160Gb
The 160gb is drive C the other is drive J
I want to format both and start again so that I can use the 500Gb H/D as
drive C and the 160gb drive as the backup drive. I did have windows on both
until I formatted drive "C" the 160Gb drive

I have formatted the 160Gb drive at present "C" and want to format the 500Gb
drive "J". However when I try to format via disc management, it will not
allow me to do it.

Why is this and how can I format it so that I have two clean formatted Hard
drives so that I can start with a clean slate.

Lastly, I was initially told by the computer supplier I bough the system
from that I could use the 160Gb H/D to mirror the 500Gb H/D so that If
anything untowards happened on the 500Gb H/D, I would still have everything
on my 160Gb H/D. I was told that this "mirroring" could be carried out
automatically without me doing a manual backup.

I am now told that the only way to do this is to configure in "RAID"
configuration but to do this, I need to have both H/D the same size.

Frankly, I am loosing trust and patience with the manufacturer, they don't
seem to know what they are talking about.

Can anyone please help me with both problems.

Regards

 

[DL]

You cannot format the system drive within windows, that would be the same as
cutting off a branch whilst your sitting on it.
Open your case, disconnect your 160gb and any media readers or any other
periferals, ensure 500gb is connected as master, boot with the winxp cd,
partition / format / install
*NB* However since it appears you may have sata drives it depends what sata
controler is being used as you may need to use the F6 option to install
sata/raid drivers from floppy during the installation process. You would
need to check the manual or motherboard manual for your system.

You can mirror using raid with different size drives, however you would only
have the size of the smallest available, so in your case a waste of drive
capacity

 

[chesjak]

Thanks DL

You cannot format the system drive within windows, that would be the same as
cutting off a branch whilst your sitting on it.
Open your case, disconnect your 160gb and any media readers or any other
periferals, ensure 500gb is connected as master, boot with the winxp cd,
partition / format / install
*NB* However since it appears you may have sata drives it depends what sata
controler is being used as you may need to use the F6 option to install
sata/raid drivers from floppy during the installation process. You would
need to check the manual or motherboard manual for your system.

You can mirror using raid with different size drives, however you would only
have the size of the smallest available, so in your case a waste of drive
capacity

 

[Joe H]

You cannot format the system drive within windows, that would be the
same as cutting off a branch whilst your sitting on it. Open your
case, disconnect your 160gb and any media readers or any other
periferals, ensure 500gb is connected as master, boot with the winxp
cd, partition / format / install *NB* However since it appears you
may have sata drives it depends what sata controler is being used as
you may need to use the F6 option to install sata/raid drivers from
floppy during the installation process. You would need to check the
manual or motherboard manual for your system.

You can mirror using raid with different size drives, however you
would only have the size of the smallest available, so in your case a
waste of drive capacity

A far simpler approach than installing windows from scratch and all the
updates and patches would be to buy Acronis backup software for $49 and
make an image of the 160g drive on that same drive -- or just download
the trial and use it to do the job. Then restore that image to your new
500g drive and switch the two drives, then reboot -- done. The backup
would normally take maybe 15 mins and the restore even less. Once you
boot with the new drive, you can wipe the 160g and use however.

I have nothing to do with Acronis -- but I used to use and recommend
driveimage until version 7 -- after spending 7 hours to back up a 40 g
partition and restore it on a new drive which did not boot. Also tried
Norton Ghost and it didn't work either. Acronis worked the first time
and took about 30 mins to backup and 10 mins to restore on the new
drive and worked immediately. I've been using it for two years now and
find it indispensable. There may be some freeware program out there
that does as good a job but I've not heard of it.

--