formatting the C drive

I need to reinstall Win98SE from scratch. To this end, I
formatted the C-drive, to wipe it completely. I should
note that the hard drive is partitioned in two, with the
C-drive as the working drive, and the other partition for
data storage.

I followed the steps using a bootable floppy. It all
apparently went correctly until I started to install
WIn98SE. Then I got an error message which stated that it
could not proceed with the installation.

I repeated the formatting, checked the C-drive directory,
which appeared to be wiped and clean.
I was able to write/copy to the C-drive, and then booted
the computer without the floppy, with the intent of
installing Win98SE from the CD-Rom. To my surprise, the
computer booted AS BEFORE, showed me all my hardware etc,
and started as if I had never wiped the drive.
Has anyone else tried to wipe/format a drive and found
that nothing actually happened?

Any suggestions? I dont really want to erase the entire
hard disk, since this would also wipe out the data
partition.

Thanks - Anne Dee

"Anne Dee" wrote in message
...
I need to reinstall Win98SE from scratch. To this end, I
formatted the C-drive, to wipe it completely. I should
note that the hard drive is partitioned in two, with the
C-drive as the working drive, and the other partition for
data storage.

I followed the steps using a bootable floppy. It all
apparently went correctly until I started to install
WIn98SE. Then I got an error message which stated that it
could not proceed with the installation.

I repeated the formatting, checked the C-drive directory,
which appeared to be wiped and clean.
I was able to write/copy to the C-drive, and then booted
the computer without the floppy, with the intent of
installing Win98SE from the CD-Rom. To my surprise, the
computer booted AS BEFORE, showed me all my hardware etc,
and started as if I had never wiped the drive.
Has anyone else tried to wipe/format a drive and found
that nothing actually happened?

Any suggestions? I dont really want to erase the entire
hard disk, since this would also wipe out the data
partition.

Thanks - Anne Dee


I actually ran into that once...
turned out to be either a loose or defective ide cable...

try unplugging both ends,,,then replugging...
or put in a new cable entirely.

that should hopefully solve the problem...
if not...then you have a harddrive or controller problem

Are you quite sure that the 'C' drive that you are seeing from a DOS boot is
the same as the 'C' drive you see from a hard drive boot? Software loaded at
boot time can shuffle drive letters. For instance, when you formatted the
partition did the reported size match what you expected for the size of your
C drive? When you boot to floppy and do DIR C: do you see the files you
expect to see on the C drive?
--
Jeff Richards
MS MVP (Windows - Shell/User)
"Anne Dee" wrote in message
...
I need to reinstall Win98SE from scratch. To this end, I
formatted the C-drive, to wipe it completely. I should
note that the hard drive is partitioned in two, with the
C-drive as the working drive, and the other partition for
data storage.

I followed the steps using a bootable floppy. It all
apparently went correctly until I started to install
WIn98SE. Then I got an error message which stated that it
could not proceed with the installation.

I repeated the formatting, checked the C-drive directory,
which appeared to be wiped and clean.
I was able to write/copy to the C-drive, and then booted
the computer without the floppy, with the intent of
installing Win98SE from the CD-Rom. To my surprise, the
computer booted AS BEFORE, showed me all my hardware etc,
and started as if I had never wiped the drive.
Has anyone else tried to wipe/format a drive and found
that nothing actually happened?

Any suggestions? I dont really want to erase the entire
hard disk, since this would also wipe out the data
partition.

Thanks - Anne Dee