Ignorantguy
New Member
I just bought a 500gig ext My book and im trying to format it to FAT32 using partition magic 7. For some reason windows xp wont let me format in FAT. So im trying pm7 but it wont let me either. What am i doing wrong?
Formatting HD to FAT32?
- Thread starter Ignorantguy
- Start date
XP is native to NTFS being the newer version of Windows that replaced both ME and the NT cored 2000. The one free drive tool for creating a Fat32, Fat16, NTFS, VFat, or other types of partitions for different OSs would be the free Gnome Partition Editor more commonly known as GParted.
The 0.3.3.0 live for cd version is one of the few releases of the free Linux drive tool that is "platform independent" meaning it can create partitions for other then Linux use. Fat32 won't generally see a partition formatted over some 55gb in size without a bios bypass tool to get past the limitations. A 250 Western Digital would see this using WD's own DrFat32 drive formatting tool right from their support site.
I have to agree with nexolus's question of "why Fat32?". The Disk Management tool found in "Control Panel>Administrative Tools>Computer Management>Storage" right in XP itself is able to format the external drive there. That would be with the same partition type that XP is native too and not seeing drawbacks due to Fat32's partition size limitations. NTFS is also faster and more reliable.
The 0.3.3.0 live for cd version is one of the few releases of the free Linux drive tool that is "platform independent" meaning it can create partitions for other then Linux use. Fat32 won't generally see a partition formatted over some 55gb in size without a bios bypass tool to get past the limitations. A 250 Western Digital would see this using WD's own DrFat32 drive formatting tool right from their support site.
I have to agree with nexolus's question of "why Fat32?". The Disk Management tool found in "Control Panel>Administrative Tools>Computer Management>Storage" right in XP itself is able to format the external drive there. That would be with the same partition type that XP is native too and not seeing drawbacks due to Fat32's partition size limitations. NTFS is also faster and more reliable.
Direct from Microsoft! The 55-64gb limitation is seen on fdisk itself which would be one tool for a dos boot floppy. The idea of DrFat was to bypass the limitations seen on old systems for the ability to see larger Fat32 partitions.
In theory 98 was supposed to able to support upto 8tb for a partition. But in practical working terms your average desktop in years past was too limited to see anything like that. Microsoft did release an updated version of fdisk for use on larger capacity drives. But it still took WD's DrFat32 to see a working primary for 98 on a 250gb hard drive in older builds.
For Fat32 and use with XP one MS page sums up the limitations very well. You can review that at http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314463/EN-US/
To answer your question...
Make an 98/95 bootdisk... www.bootdisk.com (I think)
Pop the disk in an boot from it. Type in fdisk. Click on 4 and press enter. Remember the type, go to the deletion part and delete the partition, not make another partition, use max size. Get your OS disk, delete that partition and make an FAT32 or partition.
Hope that helped.
Make an 98/95 bootdisk... www.bootdisk.com (I think)
Pop the disk in an boot from it. Type in fdisk. Click on 4 and press enter. Remember the type, go to the deletion part and delete the partition, not make another partition, use max size. Get your OS disk, delete that partition and make an FAT32 or partition.
Hope that helped.
They were called bios bypass utilties in those times before the chipsets allow for the new ATA100 to come seeing larger drives available. 13gb was once a super sized drive about 8yrs. ago. But even with lba there where still some problem due to Fat32 to overcome. The updated fdisk then allowed for a larger partition.
With the drive being an external usb type fdisk won't work from any boot floppy. Ignorantguy's reference to a MyBook external drive means a partitioning tool that works in Windows would be needed. This is another reason why the Disk Management tool or a software like Partition Magix for an NTFS type partition would be far better for the larger drive there. This is why the question of "why Fat32?" was asked from the beginning.
MixedLogik
New Member
FAT 32 is a different filing system from others. Others operating system such as UNIX run better on a FAT32 interface.
That was not the discussion. You said the fat32 limitation was caused by bios. The issue in old days was adressing raw sectors on the harddrive. So the limitation would go for all file systems
The method of bios bypass was at a time when drives were larger then supported by many boards plus Fat based versions needed help recognizing the full capacities seen with the larger drives then becoming available. It was the updated fdisk that saw a max of 55gb-64gb while drive utilities by WD, Seagate, Maxtor, etc. would allow 98 or ME to realize a single primary on a 200+gb sized drive.
The two problems there are 1) an even larger drive to start with and more importantly 2) an external usb type where I doubt even GParted would actually see it. That loads from a cd-r without usb support included being a Linux drive tool.
NTFS takes the lead by a long shot over the now far outdated Fat type of partition and is common to the newer versions of Windows to come after Vista as well as XP. The Disk Management tool in XP there would see the external drive partitioned, formatted, and ready for immediate use since the PM 7 won't work for a Fat type.
Linux is based on the UNIX platform and used VFat 24bit not Fat32 with a different architecture to start with. This is why you can read a Linux partition while running Windows. Yet a live for cd distro is often a great tool for retrieving files off of an MS type partition when a drive becomes inaccessible.
The two problems there are 1) an even larger drive to start with and more importantly 2) an external usb type where I doubt even GParted would actually see it. That loads from a cd-r without usb support included being a Linux drive tool.
NTFS takes the lead by a long shot over the now far outdated Fat type of partition and is common to the newer versions of Windows to come after Vista as well as XP. The Disk Management tool in XP there would see the external drive partitioned, formatted, and ready for immediate use since the PM 7 won't work for a Fat type.
Linux is based on the UNIX platform and used VFat 24bit not Fat32 with a different architecture to start with. This is why you can read a Linux partition while running Windows. Yet a live for cd distro is often a great tool for retrieving files off of an MS type partition when a drive becomes inaccessible.
I'm not sure why you keep talking about old stuff (unless the op plans to access the drive on a very old system), that is not directly releated to how fat32 works, and how large partitions it support. Even the 128GB barrier is not fat32 related
Linux can read fat32 because Microsoft has released the specs on it. It's not a complicated story.
Linux can read fat32 because Microsoft has released the specs on it. It's not a complicated story.
Ignorantguy
New Member
What I want to do is use this drive for my divx movies connected to my divx dvd player that only supports fat16/32. It wont let me convert from NTFS. I can only reformat in NTFS and Linux ext2. And if I delete the NTFS partion and try to reformat in FAT32 as primary or logical I get an error: #708. Sometimes error: Divison by zero shows up too. I tried to look up the errors in the technical support guide too but it doesnt reference errors in the 700 range goes from 600-663 and then 900-? No 700 errors at all. Is even possible to do what I want?
The main problem besides seeing several small partitions for Fat on it is it being an external not internal type drive via usb. Prior to XP there was no Disk Management tool available for the Fat32 versions 98 and ME. The fdisk tool is out since that works off of a boot floppy not loading the usb drivers that would be needed to detect the drive.
You would have to go for an internal 500gb ide model to see a drive tool provided by the drive's manufacturer used to see Fat32. I never tried DrFat32 on a drive over 250gb then to see if it has a certain size limitation on the tool there. The information on the external drive itself would specify the operating system requirements for use.
You would have to go for an internal 500gb ide model to see a drive tool provided by the drive's manufacturer used to see Fat32. I never tried DrFat32 on a drive over 250gb then to see if it has a certain size limitation on the tool there. The information on the external drive itself would specify the operating system requirements for use.
The one possible solution for seeing a small Fat32 partition would be the use of a usb to ide or sata type adapter where fdisk or another partitioning tool capable of creating that type of partition could then be used. The cost is about $30 for the one seen at http://www.cablestogo.com/product.asp?cat%5Fid=1501&sku=30504
Once you have access to the drive by way of fdisk or an older dos tool provided by the drive's manufacturer you would be able to create a somewhat large Fat32 primary and simply install XP onto a second NTFS primary using the first for video files.
Once you have access to the drive by way of fdisk or an older dos tool provided by the drive's manufacturer you would be able to create a somewhat large Fat32 primary and simply install XP onto a second NTFS primary using the first for video files.
Or you could just use a windows tool.
this one is free, and promise to support large partitions:
http://www.compuapps.com/download/Swissknife/swissknife.htm
this one is free, and promise to support large partitions:
http://www.compuapps.com/download/Swissknife/swissknife.htm
That would be more suitable since it is cross platform for the different partition types between the different versions of Windows. That clearly indicates use with external as well as internal hard drives. Using an adapter is simply a hardware method of getting fdisk's or a manufacturer's dos type drive tool's limitattions. It's free to try over paying out some $30.