M
Michel Merlin
How to Format a SATA HD in Windows 2000?
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On a desktop PC with W2KSP4 US (Athlon XP 2000+, 512MB, Maxtor
ATA133/PCI controller card, and Connectland "Silicon Image SiI
3112 SATARaid Controller" SATA-I/PCI controller cards, 3 IDE
racks accomodating in turn a dozen IDE HDs, Enermax
EG375AX-VE-W), I bought 2 SATA-II HDs (Hitachi T7K250,
http://www.hitachigst.com/hdd/support/t7k250/t7k250.htm , in the
250GB size, HDT722525DLA380).
When connecting one HD onto the SATA/PCI card (using good
shielded SATA cables), and booting in DOS using a Windows 98 SE
Starting Disk (completed, updated, and rewritten on a CD), I
FDISK-ed it (using the "more-than-64GB" version of FDISK). It
appeared with a very small capacity (something like 23GB IIRC).
I partitioned and formatted it anyway (just one "small" primary
active DOS partition so far).
But in rebooting in W2K, "Start > Settings > Control Panel >
Administrative Tools > Computer Management > Disk Management", I
get a dialog (best viewed in "Courier New" or "FixedSys" or
other Fixed-width font - may require copying into Notepad):
____________________________________________________________
| |
| Write Signature and Upgrade Disk Wizard |
|____________________________________________________________|
| |
| (Books Welcome to the Write Signature |
| icon) and Upgrade Disk Wizard. |
| |
| This wizard writes signatures on new disks, and |
| upgrades empty basic disks to dynamic disks. |
| |
| You can ............. |
| .......... restarting the computer. |
| |
| After you upgrade a disk, you cannot use earlier |
| versions of Windows on any volume on that disk. |
| |
| To continue, click Next. |
| ................ |
| | Next | | Cancel | |
|____________________________________________________________|
As you think I immediately decided to NOT apply that "Write
Signature" or that "Wizard". But when Canceling that
self-appointed Wizard, Disk Management shows me:
(red forbidden icon) Disk 1 |
Unknown | 232.88 GB
232.88 GB | Unallocated
Online |
Of course no partition is displayed - and accordingly in Windows
Explorer the HD doesn't show in any way.
I bought those HDs for backup purpose, I can accept to have them
unable to boot an OS, but I would prefer to avoid this
MS-paranoiac limitation. Anyway I need them quickly formatted
and in use. Can anyone help?
Paris, Mon 27 Mar 2006 17:22:30 +0200
~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-
On a desktop PC with W2KSP4 US (Athlon XP 2000+, 512MB, Maxtor
ATA133/PCI controller card, and Connectland "Silicon Image SiI
3112 SATARaid Controller" SATA-I/PCI controller cards, 3 IDE
racks accomodating in turn a dozen IDE HDs, Enermax
EG375AX-VE-W), I bought 2 SATA-II HDs (Hitachi T7K250,
http://www.hitachigst.com/hdd/support/t7k250/t7k250.htm , in the
250GB size, HDT722525DLA380).
When connecting one HD onto the SATA/PCI card (using good
shielded SATA cables), and booting in DOS using a Windows 98 SE
Starting Disk (completed, updated, and rewritten on a CD), I
FDISK-ed it (using the "more-than-64GB" version of FDISK). It
appeared with a very small capacity (something like 23GB IIRC).
I partitioned and formatted it anyway (just one "small" primary
active DOS partition so far).
But in rebooting in W2K, "Start > Settings > Control Panel >
Administrative Tools > Computer Management > Disk Management", I
get a dialog (best viewed in "Courier New" or "FixedSys" or
other Fixed-width font - may require copying into Notepad):
____________________________________________________________
| |
| Write Signature and Upgrade Disk Wizard |
|____________________________________________________________|
| |
| (Books Welcome to the Write Signature |
| icon) and Upgrade Disk Wizard. |
| |
| This wizard writes signatures on new disks, and |
| upgrades empty basic disks to dynamic disks. |
| |
| You can ............. |
| .......... restarting the computer. |
| |
| After you upgrade a disk, you cannot use earlier |
| versions of Windows on any volume on that disk. |
| |
| To continue, click Next. |
| ................ |
| | Next | | Cancel | |
|____________________________________________________________|
As you think I immediately decided to NOT apply that "Write
Signature" or that "Wizard". But when Canceling that
self-appointed Wizard, Disk Management shows me:
(red forbidden icon) Disk 1 |
Unknown | 232.88 GB
232.88 GB | Unallocated
Online |
Of course no partition is displayed - and accordingly in Windows
Explorer the HD doesn't show in any way.
I bought those HDs for backup purpose, I can accept to have them
unable to boot an OS, but I would prefer to avoid this
MS-paranoiac limitation. Anyway I need them quickly formatted
and in use. Can anyone help?
Paris, Mon 27 Mar 2006 17:22:30 +0200