"Jeff Richards" wrote in message
...
"philo" wrote in message
...

snip

If you are still around Doug, this could be settled by just looking at
the
message
on the screen as the machine boots up.
It will say something like EZ Bios.. then specify which key to hit to
boot
from floppy
(I forgot the exact wording.) If the machine has that message now...
or if it had such a message before and no longer has it...then indeed it
looks like an overlay problem.

IT WON'T BE THERE. The problem is that the overlay is NOT being invoked
at
boot time, so the partition is not recognized as valid.

As I stated before...EZ bios is not easy to wipe out,
it will not be wiped out by a format. It will not even be wiped out by a
fdisk /mbr
I have tried it. I suggest you find a spare harddrive and give it a test if
you don't
believe me.

EZ BIOS needs to be unininstalled by the utility that installed it in the
first place.
(though IIRC there are several different overlays and one setup program can
remove
an overlay created by the other.)
I cannot imagine that the OP could have forgotten uninstalling the overlay.
He seems to have done
the reinstall just a few weeks ago...
he certainly did not mention such when you asked him.

snip

and there are other reasons why the second drive is unreadable.
It could be something as simple as a loose IDE cable.

The second drive is readable. FDISK reported the partitioning.

No, the drive is *NOT* readable to the OS. If the OP could read it why would
he have posted he

___begin quote

My computer recognizes the former D
drive but when I try to read it I get a message that says D:\ is not
accessible.


___end of quote


I have absolutely seen drives with a partially slipped back IDE connector
that were detected by the bios, yet had some type of serious problem
that made them either unreadable...or in one case...made a drive read only.

I am not saying that's what happened...merely saying there are other
possibilities.


The OP might have run fdisk and deleted the drive, then recreated it in
error and not formatted it. etc

I think OP would have remembered FDISKing his backup data and having to
re-create a partition.


You are correct I'd think he'd have remembered that...
OTOH: I say he should also have recalled uninstalling the drive overlay.
Unless we can talk to the OP and ask him all that he had done...
it's still within the realm of speculation.


As far as data recovery goes...I cited the case of a non-detected drive
merely as a hopeless scenario...
which this is not. Also as I said earlier...data recovery operations do
not destroy data which are on a drive...
it's more a matter of whether the data are recovered or not.

Earlier? Only after I prompted you with a warning about how dangerous
this
is. Your first comment was "Google for data recovery software", and that
carries a major risk that OP will think that data recovery software is
needed and should be used, thus risking a large portion of his data. If
you really meant "Run some data recovery software to examine that
partition
without attempting to recover any of the files but just to see what's
there"
I would not have commented, even though I think it's a waste of time.


Again...installing data recovery software is only dangerous if it's being
installed on the partition where the lost data exists. Since the OP
cannot access his 2nd drive...I think it quite impossible that he install
the software there. Software normally installs on the system drive by
default anyway.

Data recovery software , though of course may turn up nothing...
generally works as long as the user has not attempted to write or alter in
any way... the "troubled" disk.
It does not hurt anything to try.

Again...the existence of a drive overlay was never answered by the OP
when you had asked that question.

I'll say it again - if he knew this was the problem he had no need to post
his question.

BTW: As flakey as my own news-server may be at times...
I can see more messages on it than if I use the Microsoft server
directly.
I have no clue as to why...so I often use whichever seems to be working
best
at the time.

Then you should be framing your replies on the basis that you do not have
the whole picture.


As I said: It's the MS server that is giving me the problem...
and that is why I look on both servers. Though I have once recently
had a post dropped, then re-appear...Since I can follow threads...
it's not likely I've missed anything. It seems there was nothing on this
thread
I've missed at least.

I hope the OP returns but I think he may be gone for good.

I think you and I both know that if the machine was sitting on either one of
our benches,
we'd have it figured out in a few minutes.

Trouble-shooting "long distance" is tediously slow. Heck,
with the machine on the bench either one of us could have tried about a
dozen
things in just a few minutes and have been done with it in the time it takes
to make a single post.

Nice talking to you at any rate.