In over my head


  #1  
Old 01-01-02, 01:48 PM
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Question In over my head

I am upgrading my PII-266 with a seemingly new 20 GB hard drive and switching from Win 98 to Win 2000. I sucessfully installed the drive and set it up with the Win2000 program. After installing only Win 2000 I found the hard drive to be nearly full. It seems the shop must have formatted the drive and dumped some programs on it. I'm ok with this because it's a good quality drive that I got for a steal.
My problem: I want to reformat the drive to wipe everything out and do a clean install of 2000, but I am unsure how. I tried to reformat the drive but I get the message that says I can't reformat from the Win 2000 program. I also tried from the dos prompt and from safe mode but that wouldn't work either.
What am I missing?
 
  #2  
Old 01-02-02, 12:48 AM
mikejmerritt
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Give This a Try

FORMAT
Make boot disk from your 2000 CD if you havn't.
Boot up with your boot disk and enable cdrom support when Windows asks you...otherwise cdrom support will automatically appear if you used a boot disk that you downloaded or created yourself. Keep an eye on the screen to see which drive letter has been assigned because it won't be the same one you had in Windows before, and then change to that drive letter. Make sure you can access the cdrom with that disk by changing to the cdrom drive with a cd in the drive and type DIR at the cdrom prompt...if it shows you the list of files on the cd, you are good to go so change back to the A: prompt.

At the A: prompt, type FORMAT C: /S to get the boot drive ready to receive data. If you have already formatted the drive, then at the A: prompt type SYS C: instead.

Now if you have enabled the cdrom support, you can change to the cdrom drive ( so as it is loading, watch for which drive letter it has assigned), and put your Windows installation cd into the drive and type SETUP....the installation will begin....Hope this helps ....Mike


Oh yeah, one more thing...Did you set Folder Options to show all files and see if the drive was partitioned. These shops love to partition. Had one the other day with new huge drive and after installing a couple of hundred MB's it drive was full. This can't be. A trip to Explorer showed why......Four partitions and not a word to the poor owner who almost knows how to send email.......This really has no connection to the above question, DO a full format and know what you have.....but if its partitioned see whats there. If you have backup software you could end up with a program or two to play with......Mike
 

Last edited by mikejmerritt; 01-02-02 at 03:38 AM.
  #3  
Old 01-02-02, 12:09 PM
bigmike
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Cool A 266?

My concern is whether or not that 266 will run 2000. My test 350 at 393 megs of RAM barley ran it.
 
  #4  
Old 01-02-02, 12:46 PM
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uhm...mikejmerritt I hate to disagree but Win2000 actually takes 4 floppy disks to boot and you never get an A:\. With NT the best way to do a complete format is to boot from the CD-ROM if your systems bios will handle it. Otherwise you need to go to a utility on CD-ROM to make the 4 floppies. During the installation questions you will be asked where you want to install Win2000. At this screen you can delete the existing partions and create a new partition. You will also need to decide then whether or not to use FAT or NTFS as your file system.

By the way, Win2000 only should take up about 2 gigs of space.

I agree with BigMike though, I'm not sure how well it will run on a 266.
 
  #5  
Old 01-02-02, 01:35 PM
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Thumbs up

mrhoadar is correct about the four floopy boot disks.
I am lucky with this upgrade because I am replacing a working hard drive. Thanks to bios auto-detect I am able to switch hard drives at will and was able to make the boot floppies on a working system.
New hard drive is formatted and partitioned and the Win 2000 install went well.
Microsoft system requirements for Win 2000 Professional are
P 166 processor with 64 megs of ram. I have 266 mhz and 320 megs ram and should be ok.
My reason for trying 2000 is system stability, which win 98 certainly isn't. I have heard ME is not much better and would never buy into the XP principle. (Until I'm forced to.) I like to own what I buy.
The biggest drawback of Win 2000 is hardware support. There is a lot that seems to not work with it. Right now I can't get my modem to work on Win 2000, so after this posting, I'm off on a search to see if my modem is compatible or maybe look for a new driver.
Thanks for your interest.
 
  #6  
Old 01-02-02, 02:10 PM
bigmike
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Cool ME

I dont know why everyone yells about ME. I have found it to be the most stable, user friendly OS from MS ever put out. I have hammered this build of ME in the last few weeks and still it keeps running. I do plan to re-instal soon but only because of problems I have caused. A bad NIC card caused 20 plus hard locks in a few hours, bad Java scripting hammered me last night but I still recovered the system and it is running perfect right now. The only reason I want to reinstal is the fact of previous hardware failures that caused hard locks. This very same ME that I am running right now lasted 2 years on the last build. Was still running perfect but in my infinite wisdom I wanted to try 2000. What a waste of time! I have not spent hundreds of dollars on Sound Blaster Live! Vodoo, ATI cards for multiple monitors etc to be told they are not supported when they are top of the line. XP is just plain crap, nothing else to say. 98 SE was buggy as wel as all previous os's. I really would like to know what problems people are having?The ones I see and help with are printer, glide, file assc., hardware failure type things here. Drivers MUST be kept up to date and cheap software is just that, cheap. End of rant...
 
  #7  
Old 01-02-02, 04:00 PM
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I am not afraid of a challenge, but this one is beginning to give me a headache.
bigmike: I really appreciate your comments as I am somewhat of a "dummy" when it comes to computers. I enjoy getting inside and "messing" around, but often run into roadblocks because of my lack of knowledge. I formulate my opinions, on other people's opinions. My interest in Win 2000 is based on my son's familiarity with it. He is a programer/analyst by profession, but I am trying to wean myself of his assistance, so that I can be independant when he leaves home. What a switch eh?
Win 2000 is running ok, but I have to figure out why my modem doesn't work. I think something went wrong with autodetect and maybe installed it on the wrong port. I'll beat my head against the wall for a while and come back here if I can't figure it out.
When you say that your hardware was not supported by Win 2000 do you mean that you got the unsupported warning and then installed it anyway, or did the hardware just not work.

Thanks again.
 
  #8  
Old 01-03-02, 03:00 AM
bigmike
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Cool Support

No the SB Live and the Voodoo video had no drivers for 2000. So off it came. Have you looked in Device manager to see if the modem is throwing an error? Exclamation point or red X? You might try shutting down, pull the modem and re-boot. Check to make sure the modem software is completely gone. Shut down and re-install the modem, boot up and let the plug-n-pray do it's thing. That is the equivalent to installing a new card. See if this works...
 
  #9  
Old 01-03-02, 05:45 AM
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2 things

1. When I switch people from 98SE to 2000 my support calls drop about 80% but some hardware did have to go overboard. Vendors only tend to write drivers for what's hot in the consumer market. You should start seeing more drivers for NT (2000 and XP). But you think finding drivers for XP is bad; try finding them for Linux.

2. Getting to the modem settings is a little different in NT. right-click My Network Places and choose Properties. Then right-click the local connection for the modem. If you have a nick card or an AOL account there may be more than one. Again choose Properties. This will get you to a more familiar dialoge box for checking modem settings.
 
  #10  
Old 01-03-02, 09:45 AM
bigmike
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Cool 2000

OK Michael I am going to give 2000 one more shot. What do I need to do? Upon your answer going to format NTFS and shoot it again. System run down...

- Tyan Trinity AT main board @ 100 MHz front end buss 99 Bios that has been flashed from 98 American Mega trends.
- AMD K6/350 (w/super cooler)
- 1 Meg L2
- 393 Megs Dimm
- SB Live FX audio
- Banshee 16 Meg (Voodoo) AGP video
- One NIC card
- 4 Meg Rage 2C PCI video (for 2ond monitor)
- 32 spin CD
- 3 1/2 floppy (these last 2 will obviously run generic drivers)
- 2 LPT and Com 2 for 2 printers and Palm 3C. (No biggie these will take care of themselves.)

When I tried to install 2000 Corporate last time I got hammered. All kinds of network problems, audio, video... Audio/Video was no support but I have a good friend, head tech at Creative that got me the right software but has not been tried so no idea if it's right or not. Lotta faith in my buddy huh? The network wound up being a bad card and even ME corp. edition freaked till I figured it out. (The card that only failed 1/2 duplex) but I am now getting to many hangs and blue screens from Office XP/Outlook 2000 so I feel the need to clean up and re-install. I have severely damaged the registry from MULTIPLE hard locks etc. Advice from y'all 2000 users to this ME fanatic will be accepted. If it don't work I may marry your sister, get a redneck in the family tree Not afraid to say I am scared of 2000 and very little knowledge of it. Thanks... Mike
 
  #11  
Old 01-03-02, 12:56 PM
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Smile

Glad to see someone else stick up for Win 2000. I had looked into it and found stability to be it's main selling feature. I guess that because it's a work horse program and not designed for the average consumer, I would be prepared for some minor hardware changes. Especially since most my hardware is around three years old anyway.
I'll shut this thing down and stick in my Winn 2000 loaded HD in now and try the complete uninstall - install trick and give the plug and cry one more try.
If this doesn't work I'll come back with some better info.
 
  #12  
Old 01-03-02, 02:05 PM
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My method which usually seems to work but I admit I work with a lot more standardized hardware. Also must admit I never tried it on a K6 or any of the VooDoo cards. On the later point I would use the ATI as the main monitor for installation.

Boot from the CD and do a clean install on either Fat or NTFS. I only use NTFS for the extra security.

DO NOT INSTALL ANY THIRD PARTY SOFTWARE UNTIL AFTER YOU APPLY SERVICE PACK 2 AND ANY HARDWARE DRIVERS FOUND AT HTTP://WINDOWSUPDATE.MICROSOFT.COM !!!!!

Check Device Manager to see if anything still needs a driver. Then go to the manufacture's web site and find the latest drivers. Don't use anything from a CD that came with it.

On the Office XP issue, I don't believe the first service pack was out for that when you tried this last. All Microsoft software is buggy untill the first service pack is applied. Again, apply all the updates at office.microsoft.com.

After all the Microsoft stuff is happy then start loading the fun stuff.
 
  #13  
Old 01-03-02, 02:53 PM
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I've done the uninstall - install thing and the modem still can not be found. It is shown in properties, but will not communicate.
Here are my settings:
On the Win 98 system which works:
Under Modem Properties; Port - COM 3, Resources; Input/Output Range -03E8-03EF, Interupt Request - 10
Under Com Port Properties; COM 1, Resources; Interupt Request - 04, Input /Output Range - 03F8-03FF,
COM 2, Input/Output Range - 02F8-02FF, Interupt Request - 03

In the Win 2000 system after auto-detect;
Under Modem Properties; Port - Com 3, Resources; Input/Output Range - 02F8-02FF, Interupt Request - 03
Under Com Port Properties; Com 1, Resources; Interupt Request - 04, input/output range 03FB-03FF.

There is an ethernet card in my system but I can't tell if it is connected to a com port.
I am not sure why my modem shows up on Com Port 3 when my device manager doesn't show a Com Port 3.
Also, I have installed a driver for the modem which says it is for Win 2000, and I checked that the modem jumpers are set to plug and play.
 
  #14  
Old 01-04-02, 11:10 AM
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What exactly isn't working with the modem? If it is in My Network Places then you should be able to go to
Start->Setting>Network and Dialup connections->Make new Connection
This should bring up the connection wizard and from there you can finish the setting for the dial up to your ISP. Don't worry about which com port Windows 2000 uses for your modem. It ususally just grabs the first available settings when doing a plug-and-play search.

By the way, we wen't through this on this forum a few months ago. The Nic card can interfere with the modem when it comes to IP.

If the computer really isn't recognizing the modem the best thing to do is delete the modem in My Network Places and in Device Manager. I think it shows up under a different icon than a com port, which may be why you don't see it in device manager.

Then reboot the computer and see if it "Discovers" the modem. Make sure it is plugged into the phone line when you do this.

One other thought, this isn't an ISA modem is it?
 
  #15  
Old 01-05-02, 09:37 AM
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Thumbs up I've made it!

Thanks for all your help.
I now have a working modem and Win 2000 running smoothly. I'm not sure what the problem was, just that a total uninstall-install did it. I may have set up to dial my ISP before I had the modem working. The installation disk for my ISP has an ancient copy of Internet Explorer that seems to install itself over newer versions so I have almost got the scripts settings to work. I am now on the net on my new HD with Win 2000 and only have to figure out how to get the scripts settings to stay and not have to be entered each time.
Again thanks alot. I've come a long way with this latest project and might just keep the cover off my 'puter, so I can find some more trouble to get myself in.
PS: Computer seems a little more peppy than before. I wonder if it's the Win 2000 or the 7200 rpm HD or both?
 
  #16  
Old 01-08-02, 03:08 PM
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Arrow Update

Win 2000 is running very well and my problems are slowly being worked out. The biggest pain with 2000 is compatibility. Modem problem; After trying everything within my capabilities, a trip to my local ISP taught me that Win 2000 needed a different login script than 95, 98, ME and Xwhatever. Great learning experience. They couldn't find any disks with the correct file so they showed me what to change on the '98 script and it worked.
The other 2000 problem is with a Umax scanner. Umax has a driver update, but I havn't been able to get it to work.
Win 2000 is not quite as easy as '98, but I'm hoping it's worth the trouble.
 
 

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