Unable to format SATA Maxtor 80gb HD with XP Installed

  • Thread starter Thread starter peely
  • Start date Start date
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peely

Hello

I'm trying to wipe my system and start a fresh. Installed is Win xp and
i have now got Win xp with SP2. I want to format my drive and install
the SP2 but when i try to delete the partition it says system files are
on there and i can't delete the partition or format the drive.

This is my only HD and i'm using a Abit AN7 M/board.

Any help appreciated.

Neil
 
This is my only HD and i'm using a Abit AN7 M/board.
You cannot format sys disk within XP
You have to boot from winxp installation disk and follow the prompts.
You may have to enable boot from cd in the bios, you also may need to F6
during the install process to load third party drivers (sata) from floppy
http://michaelstevenstech.com/cleanxpinstall.html
 
I've tried to do that but it won't let me delete the partition.
Installed the sata drivers but can't delete partition due to system
files.
 
You can not cut off the tree branch while you are sitting on it. You also
can not format the Windows partition while starting a reinstall from within
Windows. It just can't happen.

As you have been told, boot up your computer from the Windows XP CD and
continue your install from there. Windows is not running at that point and
you can do anything you want with the partition.

--
Regards,

Richard Urban
Microsoft MVP Windows Shell/User

Quote from: George Ankner
"If you knew as much as you thought you know,
You would realize that you don't know what you thought you knew!"
 
Hi, Nell.
I've tried to do that
Click to expand...

You've tried to do WHAT?

Have you set your computer to boot from CD, then inserted the WinXP CD-ROM
and rebooted? Step by step, what did you do, and what results did you see?
Please try to quote verbatim any error messages you saw.

Does your Abit AN7 mobo support SATA natively? Do you need to use F6 during
WinXP Setup to install SATA drivers?

Please set your news reader (Google? Agent?) to include the prior message
in your reply so that we don't have to guess which of the several messages
in the thread you meant when you said "do that". To help you solve these
problems, we need to see the context of your comments.

RC
 
I've managed to fix the problem. booted from cd rom was able to delete
the partition and format and i now have windows freshly installed.

Thanks for the help and advise and i apologise for not been to clear in
my first reply as it;s the first time i've used google groups. will
know for next time.

Neil
 
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