Help error with PC

[ShaunyR]

I bought a new hard drive for my old pc, it was a 120 gig western digital, i used to use windows 98 on it, because it didnt need windows xp, so my dad wanted to mess around while i was gone and try to put a bootleg copy of win xp on it, now whenever i try to start up my pc i get an error, when i try to reformat using windows 98 it doesn't recognize that there is a c:, it says that there isnt one "invalid drive" or somthing. Is there any way to clear the hard drive so that I can retry to install win 98 or what should i do? please help!!!

 

[ectx]

Can you boot up with win98? Or is it that you try to reinstall win98?

 

[ShaunyR]

reinstall, well format drive c: but it says that there is no drive.

 

[mechBgon]

Boot from your Win98 CD and choose the option to start the computer up in DOS mode with CD-ROM support (I forget the precise wording here, you'll know it when you see it).

Now you should land at a command prompt saying A:\.

1. Type D: and press Enter, to switch to the CD-ROM drive.
2. Type cd win98 to switch to the CD-ROM's Win98 directory
3. Type fdisk and answer Y to the FAT32-support question it asks you, and you'll be at FDisk's 1234 menu. Choose the Delete option, and have it Delete Non-DOS Partition (adapt these instructions if I'm not hitting the wording quite right).
4. Now you should be free of the NTFS partition and can create a FAT32 partition and make it active.

Hope that works BTW, you can tell what drive letter the CD-ROM gets assigned by looking at the stuff on the screen as it gets to the A:\ prompt. If it doesn't end up on D:, then use whatever letter it does end up on. I haven't done this for a while

 

[ectx]

Originally posted by: mechBgon
Boot from your Win98 CD and choose the option to start the computer up in DOS mode with CD-ROM support (I forget the precise wording here, you'll know it when you see it).

Now you should land at a command prompt saying A:\.

1. Type D: and press Enter, to switch to the CD-ROM drive.
2. Type cd win98 to switch to the CD-ROM's Win98 directory
3. Type fdisk and answer Y to the FAT32-support question it asks you, and you'll be at FDisk's 1234 menu. Choose the Delete option, and have it Delete Non-DOS Partition (adapt these instructions if I'm not hitting the wording quite right).
4. Now you should be free of the NTFS partition and can create a FAT32 partition and make it active.

Hope that works BTW, you can tell what drive letter the CD-ROM gets assigned by looking at the stuff on the screen as it gets to the A:\ prompt. If it doesn't end up on D:, then use whatever letter it does end up on. I haven't done this for a while

mecBbgon, you the man. I forgot all about win98....

now if you care to give this guy a link to your guide ..I am sure it is the HSF

 

[mechBgon]

Originally posted by: ectx

Originally posted by: mechBgon
Boot from your Win98 CD and choose the option to start the computer up in DOS mode with CD-ROM support (I forget the precise wording here, you'll know it when you see it).

Now you should land at a command prompt saying A:\.

1. Type D: and press Enter, to switch to the CD-ROM drive.
2. Type cd win98 to switch to the CD-ROM's Win98 directory
3. Type fdisk and answer Y to the FAT32-support question it asks you, and you'll be at FDisk's 1234 menu. Choose the Delete option, and have it Delete Non-DOS Partition (adapt these instructions if I'm not hitting the wording quite right).
4. Now you should be free of the NTFS partition and can create a FAT32 partition and make it active.

Hope that works BTW, you can tell what drive letter the CD-ROM gets assigned by looking at the stuff on the screen as it gets to the A:\ prompt. If it doesn't end up on D:, then use whatever letter it does end up on. I haven't done this for a while

mecBbgon, you the man. I forgot all about win98....

now if you care to give this guy a link to your guide ..I am sure it is the HSF

Hehe, thanks Got him that link.

 

[ShaunyR]

Thanks so much, the advice worked perfectly, whats your address? I'll send you a thank you card and a box of chocolates. LOL JK but thanks alot.

 

[mechBgon]

Originally posted by: ShaunyR
Thanks so much, the advice worked perfectly, whats your address? I'll send you a thank you card and a box of chocolates. LOL JK but thanks alot.

LOL! You're welcome