Deleting the hidden partition on IBM Thinkpad drive

[Amused]

I pulled a 20GB 2.5" HDD from an IBM laptop (it was replaced by a 60GB 7200 RPM drive) and am trying to use it as a USB drive.

However, I cannot figure out how to delete the hidden "recovery" partition IBM sets up on it. Any ideas that are free? (No, I do not want to buy partition magic)

I tried booting up to an XP CD to see if I could delete the partition there, however XP setup only saw the primary partition (15.8GB).

 

[bacillus]

a low level format?

 

[Jeff7]

IBM's ZAP utility
Put it on a bootable floppy, and type zap 0 to wipe the primary master hard drive.

 

[Amused]

Originally posted by: Jeff7
IBM's ZAP utility
Put it on a bootable floppy, and type zap 0 to wipe the primary master hard drive.

Thanks... but a little problem:

I want to do this while it's hooked up as a USB drive. My lappies do not have floppies, and this wont hook up to my IDE in my desktop.

 

[Amused]

Another problem:

Zap is a DOS software utility that writes zeroes to the first 128 sectors on a hard disk drive, including the Master Boot Record and the first Partition Boot Record. It can be used with both SCSI and IDE drives.

Isn't the hidden partition at the end of the disk?

 

[Jeff7]

Originally posted by: Amused
Another problem:

Zap is a DOS software utility that writes zeroes to the first 128 sectors on a hard disk drive, including the Master Boot Record and the first Partition Boot Record. It can be used with both SCSI and IDE drives.

Isn't the hidden partition at the end of the disk?

*shrugs*
All I know is that ZAP has been quite useful to me in wiping out anything, like Linux's boot menu, hidden Compaq partitions, etc.

As for the USB part, there's a utility called Guest somewhere; I know it was used on my old parallel port ZIP drive; maybe it can be used on a USB drive. Google might be able to help...ah, never mind Google. I've stashed Ghost.exe, some USB drivers, and the autoexec/config files into a self extracting EXE here. Extract them to a bootable floppy (hopefully your desktop has a floppy drive), and boot off that. Hopefully that'll give you a drive letter for it, and maybe ZAP can find it.
I'll also advise you to disconnect your drives in the PC though, in case ZAP can't find the drive - like if you say zap 3, that'll zap the 4th disk it finds.
Good luck with this; I'd like to know how this turns out, as I've never tried ZAP on an external drive. All I know is, it's a fairly dangerous utility that works FAST. Since it goes so quick, it can't be too secure, so the data should be recoverable, but it might require some kind of pay-for software.

 

[Jeff7]

Just thought - what about WinXP's own Disk Management? Can that see the partition?

 

[Amused]

Originally posted by: Jeff7
Just thought - what about WinXP's own Disk Management? Can that see the partition?

Nope, tried that first thing

What I really want is a utility I can use from within Windows... like Partition Magic... but free. I can't see paying 40-70 bucks for something I'll only use once.

 

[bacillus]

best I can offer is to get a 2.5" to 3.5" ide adapter & connect the laptop hdd to your desktop then use the ibm utility. the adapter costs about $7.

 

[axelfox]

If it's hidden, how do you know it's there?

 

[Abhi]

Fdisk wont see it?

 

[ucdnam]

Partition Magic will see it.

 

[dkozloski]

How about IBM's version of OnTrack disk manager.