Phantom D: drive

I have a phantom D: drive on my machine of zero size, the remainder of
the drives being moved up a letter.

My Computer - Properties - Perfomance shows "Drive D is using an
MS-DOS compatibility mode file system". I did not do this.

Discwizard shows only the real partitions on the drives.

From DOS I can see the drive, but it reports "Invalid, Failed, Retry"
when I truy and access it.

This has come about following a clean install of Window98SE - I just did
a "format /s" on the C: drive to remove my old Windows98 OS.

I have tried removing the drivers within Windows and rebooting but no
change.

Any thoughts?

"Dave" wrote in message
...
I have a phantom D: drive on my machine of zero size, the remainder of
the drives being moved up a letter.

My Computer - Properties - Perfomance shows "Drive D is using an
MS-DOS compatibility mode file system". I did not do this.

Discwizard shows only the real partitions on the drives.

From DOS I can see the drive, but it reports "Invalid, Failed, Retry"
when I truy and access it.

This has come about following a clean install of Window98SE - I just did
a "format /s" on the C: drive to remove my old Windows98 OS.

I have tried removing the drivers within Windows and rebooting but no
change.

Any thoughts?


might be an mbr error
you can boot with your floppy then run fdisk /mbr

Dave,

1. Do you see this phantom drive when boot in Command Prompt (restart,
or switch your computer on, hold down left Ctrl key when BIOS tests
memory, release it when Startup Menu appears, and select this item).

If not -- most likely there is an error in partition table.

2. If yes -- boot in Windows, run (Start -- Run...) sysedit, and see if
there is a line with MSCDEX.EXE in autoexec.bat.

If yes -- remove this line at all, and save Autoexec.bat. Restart, and
see if the problem does not exist more.

--
Mikhail Zhilin
http://www.aha.ru/~mwz
Sorry, no technical support by e-mail.
Please reply to the newsgroups only.
======
On Sat, 26 Feb 2005 12:33:47 GMT, Dave
wrote:

I have a phantom D: drive on my machine of zero size, the remainder of
the drives being moved up a letter.

My Computer - Properties - Perfomance shows "Drive D is using an
MS-DOS compatibility mode file system". I did not do this.

Discwizard shows only the real partitions on the drives.

From DOS I can see the drive, but it reports "Invalid, Failed, Retry"
when I truy and access it.

This has come about following a clean install of Window98SE - I just did
a "format /s" on the C: drive to remove my old Windows98 OS.

I have tried removing the drivers within Windows and rebooting but no
change.

Any thoughts?

philo wrote:
"Dave" wrote in message
...

I have a phantom D: drive on my machine of zero size, the remainder of
the drives being moved up a letter.

My Computer - Properties - Perfomance shows "Drive D is using an
MS-DOS compatibility mode file system". I did not do this.

Discwizard shows only the real partitions on the drives.

From DOS I can see the drive, but it reports "Invalid, Failed, Retry"
when I truy and access it.

This has come about following a clean install of Window98SE - I just did
a "format /s" on the C: drive to remove my old Windows98 OS.

I have tried removing the drivers within Windows and rebooting but no
change.

Any thoughts?



might be an mbr error
you can boot with your floppy then run fdisk /mbr


Thanks. I thought about that, but was worried about running FDISK
because the disk was originally partitioned using Seagates Discwizard
program under W98, and I didn't want to screw up the disk by re-writing
the MBR in case Seagates stuff did something non-standard (On-track or
whatver).

Do you think using FDISK would be a safe thing to do?

Mikhail - it must be option "1" below - nothing in autoexec.bat and I do
see drive D in dos though it does say "Invalid media type reading drive D".

I think there were some maitnenance utilities I have with Discwizard and
will see if I can save & rewite the MBR.

Thanks

Zhilin wrote:
Dave,

1. Do you see this phantom drive when boot in Command Prompt (restart,
or switch your computer on, hold down left Ctrl key when BIOS tests
memory, release it when Startup Menu appears, and select this item).

If not -- most likely there is an error in partition table.

2. If yes -- boot in Windows, run (Start -- Run...) sysedit, and see if
there is a line with MSCDEX.EXE in autoexec.bat.

If yes -- remove this line at all, and save Autoexec.bat. Restart, and
see if the problem does not exist more.

--
Mikhail Zhilin
http://www.aha.ru/~mwz
Sorry, no technical support by e-mail.
Please reply to the newsgroups only.
======
On Sat, 26 Feb 2005 12:33:47 GMT, Dave
wrote:


I have a phantom D: drive on my machine of zero size, the remainder of
the drives being moved up a letter.

My Computer - Properties - Perfomance shows "Drive D is using an
MS-DOS compatibility mode file system". I did not do this.

Discwizard shows only the real partitions on the drives.

From DOS I can see the drive, but it reports "Invalid, Failed, Retry"
when I truy and access it.

This has come about following a clean install of Window98SE - I just did
a "format /s" on the C: drive to remove my old Windows98 OS.

I have tried removing the drivers within Windows and rebooting but no
change.

Any thoughts?

might be an mbr error
you can boot with your floppy then run fdisk /mbr


Thanks. I thought about that, but was worried about running FDISK
because the disk was originally partitioned using Seagates Discwizard
program under W98, and I didn't want to screw up the disk by re-writing
the MBR in case Seagates stuff did something non-standard (On-track or
whatver).

Do you think using FDISK would be a safe thing to do?


running fdisk /mbr should just overwrite your boot record
and not delete data on the drive...
*however you could of course end up loosing everything*...
so you should really backup your data first...

since it was a new installtion, i figured you had no data yet on the drive

On Sat, 26 Feb 2005 12:33:47 GMT, Dave
wrote:

I have a phantom D: drive on my machine of zero size, the remainder of
the drives being moved up a letter.

Any thoughts?

It is possible to get such an error with certain combinations of
extended partitions. What physical drives do you have and how are they
partitioned ?

-- Steven