A friend of mine droped me off a Compaq Presario 2500 Laptop the other day. I asked was was wrong with and she told me that when she turns it on it won't boot to windows but boots to a blue screen. So I got around to looking at it today and sure enough it booted to a blue screen. So I stuck in the XP disc, set the boot order to CD first and went to format it. It loads up everything and gets to the partition screen. Now here is where it gets weird. Its not saying it has a C: drive. Where the letters are on the left its just =-= or something like that. So i hit enter to load it on the 40gb partition and it won't let me. Some how this computer lost its C: and I don't know how to get it back so I can format it. I've never ran into a problem like this. Can anyone help me out? Thanks.
Need help formatting
- Thread starter JE78
- Start date
You mean it shows up as unallocated? Does she care about any of the data on it or did she already back up what she needed?
If it's already been backed up or she doesn't care about the data then just delete all the partitions and create one big 40GB one. Format it quick as NTFS and continue.
Or there's also other ways to get the data off like using a Linux LiveCD and mounting the ntfs/fat partition.
If it's already been backed up or she doesn't care about the data then just delete all the partitions and create one big 40GB one. Format it quick as NTFS and continue.
Or there's also other ways to get the data off like using a Linux LiveCD and mounting the ntfs/fat partition.
I had a similar issue with my Compaq Evo laptop. I had to take out the battery, but keep it plugged in, before the install process and was able to get past the format screen.
Aside from that, what kind of HD is it? Try another formatting utility. If it is Maxtor or WD then you can use their low level format utilities to see if they can see it.
Aside from that, what kind of HD is it? Try another formatting utility. If it is Maxtor or WD then you can use their low level format utilities to see if they can see it.
using XP CD to format a drive that came from a prebuilt is a bad idea
prebuits have hidden partitions/images for recov/drivers/creation of Winows CD/and backup.
you will have to get the install utility from the HDD manuf website to create a bootable floppy(s) and then zero-fill (low level format) to wipe the part table/mbr sectors and its backup
once done, of course, you will not be able to use any prebuilt recov options
prebuits have hidden partitions/images for recov/drivers/creation of Winows CD/and backup.
you will have to get the install utility from the HDD manuf website to create a bootable floppy(s) and then zero-fill (low level format) to wipe the part table/mbr sectors and its backup
once done, of course, you will not be able to use any prebuilt recov options
If all you have to do is clear the MBR you could just get a Linux floppy and type:
dd if=/dev/zero bs=512 count=1 of=/dev/hda
Disclaimer: nobody do this unless you'd like all your data gone! but this will delete those recovery partitions from the partition table. Then just use the XP install and create one big partition. This is a last resort...the recovery partition is only hidden in Windows Explorer anyway as far as I know.
Why don't you go in the XP recovery console (under "Repair") and do:
fixmbr
fixboot
dd if=/dev/zero bs=512 count=1 of=/dev/hda
Disclaimer: nobody do this unless you'd like all your data gone! but this will delete those recovery partitions from the partition table. Then just use the XP install and create one big partition. This is a last resort...the recovery partition is only hidden in Windows Explorer anyway as far as I know.
Why don't you go in the XP recovery console (under "Repair") and do:
fixmbr
fixboot
well I got it back to the the C: but I think the HDD is bad. Each time I try to format it it tells me "setup was unable to format the partition, the disc may be damaged. I've tried the quick format and the normal format for NTFS which is what the drive is now. I have tried the Compaq discs that came with the computer and I get the same error. I've tried taking out the battery but didn't have any luck. She had backed up all her stuff and that was the last time she got to windows before and I have yet to beable to get into windows. Anyone have any more ideas?
I've been running HDD Regenerator 1.51 for the last 6 hours. So far out of a 40gb HDD its scanned 7mb and has found 44 bad sectors and has restored 25 of them. Does this program usualy take this long or is the HDD pretty muc FUBAR?
Well I just wanted to make sure since its not my computer before I called her and told her what was going on. Anyone else wanna chime in?
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