Format

Christian Darrall · 07-06-2006, 12:22 AM

Well, today my hard drive be came corrupted and came up with the message sayin "C:\ is not formatted" C:\=secondary blank drive, os is on D:

so when i format it, near the end of the format it says windows was unable to format the drive,

How do i fix this prob

BTW: im on windows 2000

PC eye · 07-06-2006, 12:30 AM

OUCH! Hopefully you didn't the information off of the drive there. Do you have an old 98 startup floppy hanging around somewhere? By booting off of that having set the boot order in the bios to floppy you can type in the "fdisk /mbr" command once you are at the dos prompt and press enter. What this is supposed to do and does work at times is repair the master boot record that gives loading instructions to Windows. Give this a try even if you have to use the 2000 start floppy. The 98 floppy evens works with XP however.

Christian Darrall · 07-06-2006, 12:35 AM

just soos you know there is no os on the C:, i lost all 40gb of data,

PC eye · 07-06-2006, 01:44 AM

That's not good! But I know the feeling lately when losing everything off of the first 250gb drive here due to a bios problem. The drive being slaved to a brand new one saw both failing to be recognised. First the new battery saw results until the memory timings even had to be reduced. But that is from a now failing chipset itself.

If the battery on your board is still good try clearing the cmos and try setting the second drive to the cable select jumper setting if not unplugging it temporarily. I've run dual drives here often and run into this a few times where a drive wasn't seen. You may even have to set both to the cable select position to run them together later. The master should be left at the master setting while trying both CS and SL setting for the second drive. I was about to make a few data dvds to backup some 180gb of data like video files, utilities, updates, etc. when it happened here.

Give these a try to see if you get some good results though.

Christian Darrall · 07-06-2006, 10:47 AM

ok so heres the update,

I managed to get into the drive by booting into safe mode, the drive managment in administrative tools, and i formatted it from there, it worked,

i managed to format it, but i still hav the problem of redoing my coursework, due in TOMORROW!

{LSK} Otacon · 07-06-2006, 11:03 AM

Well, good thing your OS drive didnt get corrupted then, cuz thats always the fun part re-installing your OS.

Christian Darrall · 07-06-2006, 02:42 PM

but it did, i ended up losing both data on both hdd's

Trizoy · 07-06-2006, 03:12 PM

Which means you formatted the wrong one the second time. Reinstall windows now, and then see if you can get the second one to work.

Christian Darrall · 07-06-2006, 03:44 PM

post #5

Trizoy · 07-06-2006, 03:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Christian Darrall

post #5

then post #7
Which seems like you are still having problems...

07-06-2006, 12:22 AM	#1 (permalink)
Christian Darrall Platinum Member Join Date: Feb 2006 Location: I Live in Aston Which is in the UK Age: 17 Posts: 914	Format Well, today my hard drive be came corrupted and came up with the message sayin "C:\ is not formatted" C:\=secondary blank drive, os is on D: so when i format it, near the end of the format it says windows was unable to format the drive, How do i fix this prob BTW: im on windows 2000 __________________ 1.5TB 3.0GBS Panasonic SATA XFX 9600gt Dual core X3 (super SLi) Intel Quad Core Oc'd 6.7ghZ 1000w power supply 3GB ddr 3 1200MHZ Antec Water Cooling XP Professional 19.1 inch Widescreen

07-06-2006, 12:35 AM	#3 (permalink)
Christian Darrall Platinum Member Join Date: Feb 2006 Location: I Live in Aston Which is in the UK Age: 17 Posts: 914	just soos you know there is no os on the C:, i lost all 40gb of data, __________________ 1.5TB 3.0GBS Panasonic SATA XFX 9600gt Dual core X3 (super SLi) Intel Quad Core Oc'd 6.7ghZ 1000w power supply 3GB ddr 3 1200MHZ Antec Water Cooling XP Professional 19.1 inch Widescreen

07-06-2006, 10:47 AM	#5 (permalink)
Christian Darrall Platinum Member Join Date: Feb 2006 Location: I Live in Aston Which is in the UK Age: 17 Posts: 914	ok so heres the update, I managed to get into the drive by booting into safe mode, the drive managment in administrative tools, and i formatted it from there, it worked, i managed to format it, but i still hav the problem of redoing my coursework, due in TOMORROW! __________________ 1.5TB 3.0GBS Panasonic SATA XFX 9600gt Dual core X3 (super SLi) Intel Quad Core Oc'd 6.7ghZ 1000w power supply 3GB ddr 3 1200MHZ Antec Water Cooling XP Professional 19.1 inch Widescreen

07-06-2006, 02:42 PM	#7 (permalink)
Christian Darrall Platinum Member Join Date: Feb 2006 Location: I Live in Aston Which is in the UK Age: 17 Posts: 914	but it did, i ended up losing both data on both hdd's __________________ 1.5TB 3.0GBS Panasonic SATA XFX 9600gt Dual core X3 (super SLi) Intel Quad Core Oc'd 6.7ghZ 1000w power supply 3GB ddr 3 1200MHZ Antec Water Cooling XP Professional 19.1 inch Widescreen

07-06-2006, 03:12 PM	#8 (permalink)
Trizoy VIP Member Join Date: Apr 2005 Location: Mountain View, Ca Posts: 4,664	Which means you formatted the wrong one the second time. Reinstall windows now, and then see if you can get the second one to work. __________________ 01100110 01100001 01110010 01110100

07-06-2006, 12:30 AM	#2 (permalink)
PC eye Diamond Member Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Inside a pc Posts: 19,730	OUCH! Hopefully you didn't the information off of the drive there. Do you have an old 98 startup floppy hanging around somewhere? By booting off of that having set the boot order in the bios to floppy you can type in the "fdisk /mbr" command once you are at the dos prompt and press enter. What this is supposed to do and does work at times is repair the master boot record that gives loading instructions to Windows. Give this a try even if you have to use the 2000 start floppy. The 98 floppy evens works with XP however.

07-06-2006, 01:44 AM	#4 (permalink)
PC eye Diamond Member Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Inside a pc Posts: 19,730	That's not good! But I know the feeling lately when losing everything off of the first 250gb drive here due to a bios problem. The drive being slaved to a brand new one saw both failing to be recognised. First the new battery saw results until the memory timings even had to be reduced. But that is from a now failing chipset itself. If the battery on your board is still good try clearing the cmos and try setting the second drive to the cable select jumper setting if not unplugging it temporarily. I've run dual drives here often and run into this a few times where a drive wasn't seen. You may even have to set both to the cable select position to run them together later. The master should be left at the master setting while trying both CS and SL setting for the second drive. I was about to make a few data dvds to backup some 180gb of data like video files, utilities, updates, etc. when it happened here. Give these a try to see if you get some good results though.

07-06-2006, 11:03 AM	#6 (permalink)
{LSK} Otacon banned Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: Kansas Age: 19 Posts: 400	Well, good thing your OS drive didnt get corrupted then, cuz thats always the fun part re-installing your OS.

07-06-2006, 03:44 PM	#9 (permalink)
Christian Darrall Platinum Member Join Date: Feb 2006 Location: I Live in Aston Which is in the UK Age: 17 Posts: 914	post #5 __________________ 1.5TB 3.0GBS Panasonic SATA XFX 9600gt Dual core X3 (super SLi) Intel Quad Core Oc'd 6.7ghZ 1000w power supply 3GB ddr 3 1200MHZ Antec Water Cooling XP Professional 19.1 inch Widescreen

Thread Tools
Show Printable Version Email this Page
Display Modes
Linear Mode Switch to Hybrid Mode Switch to Threaded Mode