XP says HD not formatted, I see all the files in DOS? [dos disk] [ide hard drives]
Q: For some reason one of my IDE hard drives now show as unformatted in Win XP. If I have a DOS StartUp hard disk, all files are there and I can access them. It is FAT32 and the partition shows as Active. How do I get Win XP to see it as before?
Best Answer: YOu have a mess on your hands…is sounds as if the extensions of your files have been corrupted…YOU cannot load a new version of XP over an old version simply by changing discs…passwords, disc registration all are different. REinstall the original Win XP again…OR …see if you can 'go back' to an earlier date than this installation…ALWAYS make a check point for going back to before you ever overlay the OS ! that way, if you have a mess, it can be corrected..if you did not do this, you may have to take the hard drive and have it salvaged…big bucks! My strong advice with all notebooks is to have a big drive as a side car! they run less than 100.00, use a USB connection, and are easy to load and restore with. You may have lost all your info if you have not backed it up and created a "go back to " check point. In DOS (safety mode), you can transfer these files to a side car and perhaps reload after you get done with everything. IF you have all your original programs, then at this point , it may be wiser to format the hard drive and start over doing everythign right. ! IF you get an error message about the os not being registered to this computer, call MS , tell them what happened, they will give you a code to enter and get the OS installed, then reload all programs and go from there.Then reload salvaged files and see if they work. IF not, you have lost your data. ALWAYS set a check point before doing anything to the computer, always back up to side car hard drive before playing serious games like this…avoids much pain in the long run. Good luck, Goldwing
Re:I put the drive into a Win98SE computer and it came up fine. I copied all the files off of it, then repartitioned the drive, formatted it and copied the files back onto it. Put it back into the XP machine and all is fine now.
Re:I would sgguest running a scandisk under DOS to make sure the disk integrity is ok
Re:you are probably going to have to edit the drive and make sure your harddrive has the correct filesystem ID. you can use DiskProbe that is on the WIN2K/XP disc under support tools. if you cannot do that then i suggest you move those files off that harddrive to another harddrive that is Fat32 so you can do the transfer in WIN9X. once that is done boot to XP and delete and do a slow format of the harddrive. then move your data back. i have seen this problem before. dont worry you data is fine, just move it off before things get worse.
Re:<< Or possibly the one thing you dont want to hear.. a drive going bad. >>
Upon further reflection, I would guess it's not the drive going bad, since it does show up. Does it make pinging noises? I hope not…. Hehe, but all of mine do 
.
Re:No. I checked cables and even put in a new one with no difference. I tried it alone on the cable, and also as the only ide drive on both channels with no luck. All the pins are straight also. I am going to try it in another computer and see what it comes up as.
Re:<< Whenever I have seen something like this suddenly occur when it was working fine before, it is usually a loose cable, either power cable or interface. Sometimes you can access via DOS, but once in a 32bit system thats when it gets lost. I cant explain why but thats the way it has worked for me. Its been things like one pin in the molex cable loose, or the interface cable partially pulled loose. Or possibly the one thing you dont want to hear.. a drive going bad. I would check power and interface cables for sure if there have been no major changes to software/hardware/bios settings. >>
agreed – did this fix your problem?
Re:Whenever I have seen something like this suddenly occur when it was working fine before, it is usually a loose cable, either power cable or interface. Sometimes you can access via DOS, but once in a 32bit system thats when it gets lost. I cant explain why but thats the way it has worked for me. Its been things like one pin in the molex cable loose, or the interface cable partially pulled loose. Or possibly the one thing you dont want to hear.. a drive going bad. I would check power and interface cables for sure if there have been no major changes to software/hardware/bios settings.
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Tags: dos disk, ide hard drives