• We’re currently investigating an issue related to the forum theme and styling that is impacting page layout and visual formatting. The problem has been identified, and we are actively working on a resolution. There is no impact to user data or functionality, this is strictly a front-end display issue. We’ll post an update once the fix has been deployed. Thanks for your patience while we get this sorted.

Diskette drive won't work, but want to format...

M

MaDfLaMe37

Member
I really don't know what's wrong with my diskette drive, either the actual drive is bad or the connect on my MB is bad. Either way, it's not working... Is there any way I can still format my computer without using a boot disk?
 
What kind of computer are we working with here? You CAN boot of CD-ROM's in pretty much all modern systems. It is not uncommon for Floppy drives to go bad, another common mistake is to accidentally plug the cable in backwards, in which case the light on the Floppy drive will geneally stay lit solidly the whole time. PLease tell us what sys we are working on though, and we'll get you booted up.
 
I built it myself, CT VNF4 mobo, win XP. the light doesn't light up at all, but i do hear the disk start to spin when i first put it in but after that i try to make the boot disk and it says there's no disk in the drive. also if i boot it up w/ any diskette in the drive it doesn't take notice...

i'm sure it's not plugged in backwards.
 
Check the boot order in your BIOS first thing, I have mine set to CD-ROM first, Floppy second, HDD-0 third, and whatever last.

Also try a couple different disks, bad floppy disks will often not do a damned thing.

And last, if you are wanting to do a complete clean sweep of the hard drive, you can boot off of your WinXP CD, and use the partition/format utilities there when you start in install it. If you do not want to install WinXP you can still partition/format the drive and restart the compy when its done...

BTWm are you wanting to format in NTFS, FAT32 or Other?
 
The boot order is set to read floppy's 2nd after CD.

I've tried a few different disks and makes no difference.

I do want a complete clean sweep. How do I access the partition/format utils?

I'm pretty sure I used NTFS the first time so I'll probably do the same here.
 
After you boot off of your WinXP CD, and it loads all the crap that it needs. It will eventually show you a table with the hard drives that are in your computer, asking you where to install the XP files. At this screen there is an option at the bottom of the screen either "D" or "L" I think it is to Delete Partition. select the drive you want to format, and delete the partion(s) off of it using the "D" or "L" key as directed by your computer. Then once you have the partitions deleted, it will show your hard drive as "unallocated space" Select the unallocated space, and there will be an option to "Create new partition", create a new primary partition, and select your formatting option (I ussually do the low level format NOT the quick option, but you can use either depending on your needs). Once the format is complete, you should have a blank hard drive, ready to reinstall Windows again, or whatever you wanted to do with your formatted hard drive.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

TRENDING THREADS

Back
Top