format old harddrive

[nate39]

I have a sata drive now and want to use my old ata drive for extra space. Windows is still on it and it won't let me format it. I tried booting with the windows cd but it just wants to start reloading windows in my new drive and doesn't even see my old one. Do I have to set my boot priority for my old drive? I don't think I know how to do that. How do I format my old drive, thanks

 

[HN]

you have the system up and running with the new drive? and you have the old drive connected? and the old drive shows up as a drive letter?

right click on the old drive...format.

or

control panel->administrative tools->computer management->disk management. format from there.

 

[Fern]

Do I have to set my boot priority for my old drive? I don't think I know how to do that.

No, you don't wanna boot from the driver you're trying to format. Won't work.

Boot from the sata drive(s) to be able to format the old IDE drive

 

[nate39]

I go into administrative tools and go to format and it says that it will have to force a format because there are applications running. Will it be ok to force it? I can't believe there is anything running on the old drive, I didn't boot from it.

 

[nebula]

Originally posted by: nate39
I go into administrative tools and go to format and it says that it will have to force a format because there are applications running. Will it be ok to force it? I can't believe there is anything running on the old drive, I didn't boot from it.

WAIT!!

It sounds like it's not seeing your old drive and you're trying to format the new one, BE CAREFUL!!

Jumpers on old drives can sometimes be a pain. Like Cable Select doesn't work. So make sure it's jumpered as master.

 

[nebula]

Got another idea, when I see the word "old" I tihnk really old. Anyway, what kind of drive is your old drive? Also I think the problem is if a drive has a Windows install on it but it's not the boot drive, the new Windows install has a hard time seeing it, no? What I usually end up doing is making it a slave, but you don't have that option. Or can you make a single drive a slave, don't think so.

I guess I'm just spewing out thoughts here. So if it's say a Western Digital drive, download there tools, boot to it and wipe the drive from there. Or get a boot floppy and FDISK the thing.

What do you see in Disk Management? One drive or two?

 

[Fern]

Originally posted by: nate39
I go into administrative tools and go to format and it says that it will have to force a format because there are applications running. Will it be ok to force it? I can't believe there is anything running on the old drive, I didn't boot from it.

I'd be inclined to use a boot floppy or cd with the manufacturers free downloadable tools to format the thing. I'd unhook my sata drives before booting so there w/b zero chance of an error (formating wrong drive). Like Nebula says, fdisk will do the trick too. (although many of the manufacturers free utilies have a nice GUI so it's easier to work with unless you're familiar with fdisk).

Fern

 

[nate39]

IN disk management I see both drives so I know it is the one I want to format. It is a maxtor, about 4 yrs old. I would think I could force the format. It is interesting that if I try to just delete the windows files, it starts then stops. If you right click on it and click properties you can see it reloading the files.

 

[Fern]

Since it's a Maxtor, d/l Maxblast3 (maybe they're up to 4 now?) and use it format the drive. I usually do a "quick zero-fill" first, then format.

 

[nate39]

I did that but you can't load dos with windows xp so the disk wouldn't work

OK, I went back to the website and found a program to use with windows. It let me format and set it up for storage all in windows.

 

[Fern]

I did that but you can't load dos with windows xp so the disk wouldn't work

Maxblast4 works off of a bootable floppy (or cd), so it doesn't matter what OS you have (or even if you have none). Gotta read the instructions bro

Fern

 

[nate39]

well, I might have missed something but when I booted it told me that it couldn't load dos