Win XP Pro Install Question-Strange??

[TechTodd]

ok multi boots are easy and require no third party utilities. heres how i did mine. with a 9x boot disk, make a small primary dos partition with fdisk.set it as active. if you don't have access to a pc with 2k or XP, then makean extended partition. this will be your system partition, so size accordingly. use format to format c.
then install win 9x to c: the just boot to 9x, put in your NT/2k/XP cd and install from it or flat file if you prefer.during the setupwith XP check the box that says i want to select the partition during install. setup will ask you where you want to install to, select the system partition you just made . bang you are on the way.

if you have access to 2k or XP, the just after you made your primary dos partition, take your hard drive and plug it into a 2k/xp machine as a secondary drive. go to disk management by right clicking on my computer and selecting manage. then clicking on disk management. you should see your hard drive there. from here you can partition your unallocated space into a system partition and any other drives if you wish. for the fastest os, format your system partition with NTFS and specify the cluster size as 4k from the drop down list box. also make sure your system partition isnt too big. next format your primary drive with fat 32. you are almost done. now all you have to do is install your 9x os to c:, boot to it then install your 2k/XP os and check the box i want to specify the drive and partition during setup. bang zoom off you go.

 

[bigbubchub]

....after 3 installs and days without sleep

I had something similar happen to me. I used the 6 floppy's and planned to do a format to ntsf and I also had partitioned my drive so that c:\ =4mb and D:\ got the rest. I'm running a dual boot with windows 98 on drive c:\ Fat32 4mb. and Windows XP is on d:\ NTSF. (I did that so I could still play Delta Force2 AWESOME GAME)

My first install of XP had a lot of error's and I'd installed a lot of drivers I probably didn't need. Having not fixed the hardware buts I thought the extra drivers and files were gumming things up. I decided to reformat the drive and reinstall.

I forgot that my e:\ cd rom drive was setup as a boot drive. So When I finished loading the 6 setup disks and the computer restarted it booted up to the setup disk rather than the files I'd copied from the 6 floppy disks. So now I was wondering, what is it going to do. It did manage to continue the installation using the cd rom drive but it didn't catch the format that I'd requested on the 6 floppy disks. I chose new install and it warned that it was not recommended to run 2 operating systems on the same volume. After that warning, it warned that all files in the windows directory would be lost. After 1 1/2 hours of setup the system rebooted and guess what, the files I wanted to wipe clean were still there. Apparantly the installer did not delete all the files in the windows directory but only the ones it was copying over. The lesson I learned is: Full Format

My drive has been reformatted and I've got 3 installs under my belt, yes, on 1 computer.


ps. I HATE THE SEARCH SCREEN IN WINDOWS XP!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I KNOW THERE ARE OTHERS OUT THERE WHO FEEL THE WAY I DO!

bubchub

 

[naga]

here is a way!

Start your computer with a 98 bootdisk. Go to debug, and type the following code, which wipes your partition table and forces fdisk to start over. It also wipes your bootsector. I had the same problem...this is the only way I have found to fix it.


A:\>DEBUG
- f 200 L200 0
- a 100
xxxx:0100 mov ax,301 (ignore segmentffset values at left)
xxxx:0103 mov bx,200
xxxx:0106 mov cx,1
xxxx:0109 mov dx,0080
xxxx:010C int 13
xxxx:010E int 3
xxxx:010F (Press ENTER an extra time here)
- d 100 LF
xxxx:0100 B8 01 03 BB 00 02 B9 01-00 BA 80 00 CD 13 CC
(make sure that hex values match above line before proceeding)
(if values do not match, type Q and start over)
- g=100
(ignore register display)
- q (quits back to DOS)

==============================================


Some explanation of script: (all values in DEBUG script are in HEX)
- f 200 L200 0 FILL Length of 512 bytes at offset 200 with value 0
- a 100 ASSEMBLE program at offset 100
(Next 4 lines set up registers for INT13 - Function 03)
mov ax,301 AH=03 INT13 function 03 - Write Disk Sectors
AL=01 specifies how many sectors to write (1)
mov bx,200 BH=02 BL=00 points to buffer area at offset 200
mov cx,1 CH=00 specifies cylinder 0 for INT13 function 03
CL=01 specifies sector 1 (first sector on drive)
mov dx,0080 DH=00 specifies head 0 (first head on drive)
DL=80 specifies physical fixed disk drive 1
(81=2nd drive, 82=3rd drive, 83=4th drive)
int 13 call INT13 (BIOS Fixed Disk Device Service Routine)
int 3 return to DEBUG (after assembling program)
- d 100 LF this line is optional - the resulting hex dump can be
used as a check to verify that instructions have been
entered correctly
- g=100 GO - run program stored at offset 100
- q QUIT DEBUG back to DOS prompt

==============================================
This code is courtesy of http://www.firmware.com

After all this is done, just do a clean install and make sure you don't boot from cd again after it is finished!

Hope this helps.

~steve

 

[LoctOut]

DL and use this proggy at the link below. It comes with instructions, is very easy to use . Wipes out the first 128 sectors on the drive where all your boot and partition info is located. Once you have zapped it then fdisk it to set up your partitions. Set your C drive partition active then reboot using your istall disks. If Using XP it will give you the option to format using fat or NTFS. I believe win 98 will give you a format option too, but you will need to specify fat32.

h**p://www.easydesksoftware.com/files/Zap.exe

You might want to check out this guys write up on formatting and installing too.......

http://www.easydesksoftware.com/youformat.htm

Hope it al helps

 

[phishhead]

need some help too...explained it in a new thread..need to reformat win98...http://www.xp-erience.org/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=2638

 

[WiREZ]

I have 98 and xp runnin no probs.

I used partision magic7 for patisioning. Installed 98 on 7 gig and xp on 17 gig. Both partisions are fat32.
I dont use a boot program{like already stated above, xp has its own boot loader.}