formatting problems

[RangerJoe]

im formatting my hard drive using the windows cd, you all prolly know what i mean, and every time i try to format it, it gives me this error message when it is 99% done, and it wont finish....i have checked the drive for errors...nothing...whats the problemo?

 

[WillysNut]

Was the drive working okay before you decided to reformat? Did you try the basic stuff like cleaning the disk with soap and water, cleaning your drive with canned air?

Have you tried fdisking again and starting from scratch?

 

[RangerJoe]

dude, its a hard drive..why would i clean it with soap and water??? anyway, i tried using the maxtor utility program, but for win xp, you have to have 6 floppy starup disks...which i dont have...so i tried using the win98...said something like "that OS only supports up to 7.95 gb hdd, would you like to install your drive as a 7.95 gb hard drive......so yea....im about to try again with the windows cd format or whatever

 

[tft]

from my vast experience of screwing up my drives, I've come to a method of formatting that always for me.
First make a boot disk (I use the 98 boot disk, I'd recommend doing the same)
Then go to the windows dircetory, and copy format.com to the disk.
Boot the computer using the disk, choose the start comp w/ cd rom support option. (it really doesn't matter as long a you get to the dos prompt)
Then type in: format c:/s

or,
if you feel like copying command.com after the format use:
format C:

Hope this helps

 

[RangerJoe]

well it all works now...thank God.....i dunno what the problem was either??? anything, thanks for your help guys

 

[WillysNut]

dude, its a hard drive..

So you've obviously never had a dirty disk screw up an OS install. I know it was a hard drive silly. I was referring to the fact that maybe...after the format was done, the 98 CD could not be accessed for some reason. In turn, the disk could possibly be dirty or scratched or the laser in the CD drive could be dirty.

 

[thefly]

Fdisk /mbr is sometimes good to clean out master boot record in the event that the harddrive had lilo or something odd in there.


any way, glad you got it worked out.