How to:Partition and Format with W98 Boot disk (FDISK)

[sandman55]

Ive just helped a friend set up a new Hard drive in his Win98 PC and he was interested to have a "How to Doc." so that he could do it his self next time so here it is for anyone else who may need it. I have gone overboard with the detail because some may need it . I dont think I have made any mistakes because I had a Win98 PC next to me and did the steps as I typed them.

Thanks to KingTermite for his vB Code Generator it works a treat

Win98 Partitioning and formatting with a Win98 Boot Disk

Boot up with your Win98 boot disk
Your bios must be set up with the floppy as the first boot device, try it first and if it doesn’t work then you will see on your screen on boot up how to get into setup, usually its press delete.
At the “MS Windows 98 Start-up Menu” select the choice “2. Start computer without CD-ROM support” hit enter and the computer will proceed and stop at the A: prompt.
If you are happy with the way your computer is partitioned eg. it had Win98 on it and you just want to wipe it due perhaps to a virus. Then skip straight to “Formatting”.
If it is a new drive then it will likely be formatted NTFS (New Technology Filing System) for WinXP in this case or if your not sure then read on.

Fdisk
At the A: prompt type “fdisk” without the quotes and no space and hit enter. When your prompted “Do you wish to enable large disk support (Y/N)?” choose [Y] and hit enter.
If your drive is formatted NTFS you will be asked. “Should NTFS partitions on all drives be treated as large (Y/N)?” choose [Y] and hit enter. (This step will also confirm if your Disk is formatted NTFS).

FDISK Options
We are now at FDISK Options part way down the screen you will see
“Enter choice: [ ]” type in “4” then hit enter and you will see how the drive is partitioned and formatted eg. if it is FAT 32
**Check to see if the “Volume Label” is blank, or if it has a name then write it down**
If you have an Extended DOS partition with Logical DOS Drive(s) you will be asked “Do you want to display the logical drive information (Y/N)…..? [ ]” type Y then hit enter **Check to see if the “Volume Labels” are blank, or if they have a name then write them down** hit escape
If all drives are FAT32 and the partition sizes are to your liking, then skip ahead to formatting. You can visit FDISK Options choice 4 at any time to see how you are going hit escape to get you back to FDISK Options

Explanation of partitions and logical DOS Drives
We normally have one partition to put our Operating system on, which will be the C: drive and is referred to as the Primary DOS partition and if we want any more we use the remaining space for our Extended DOS partition. This may seem confusing but think of the Extended DOS partition as a container for the logical DOS drives.
So if we divided a drive into three, we would have our Primary DOS partition which would be C: the remainder would be our Extended DOS Partition which would contain our two logical DOS Drives D: and E:

Deleting Partitions and logical DOS Drives
Before we create any partitions we have to remove what is there and it has to be done in the order of removing first the logical DOS Drives Then the Extended DOS Partitions (if that is what you have, if your not sure go back to the step “FDISK Options”) then we delete the Primary DOS Partition (which may be the only partition on your computer)

Deleting NTFS Partition
If it is an old Win98 Drive (FAT 32) go to the next step “Deleting Logical DOS Drives”
If you have a new hard drive chances are it will be a NTFS drive with one partition for WinXP, fdisk can delete one NTFS partition (If it has more than one you will have to use your WinXP disk)
At FDISK Options
Enter Choice [3]
“3. Delete partition or Logical DOS Drive” and hit enter

At the screen “Delete DOS Partition or Logical DOS Drive”
Enter Choice [4]
“4. Delete Non-DOS Partition “
Make sure the Partition number is entered [1] and hit enter
You will be asked for confirmation change the [N] to [Y] hit enter

Deleting Logical DOS Drives
OK we will assume we have three partitions C: D: and E: on our computer that we wish to remove (I have chosen three partitions to give you a better understanding of logical DOS Drives) and we are at the screen FDISK Options if not then press escape till you get there and if you end up at the A: prompt then go back to step “Fdisk.”

Enter choice: [3]
“3. Delete partition or Logical DOS Drive” and hit enter

At the screen “Delete DOS Partition or Logical DOS Drive”
Enter choice: [3]
“3.Delete Logical DOS Drive(s) in the Extended DOS Partition” and hit enter
Type the letter of the logical DOS Drive you wish to delete [D] and hit enter
If D: had a volume label type it in if it was blank just hit enter then confirm [Y] hit enter.
Type in the next drive letter [E] hit enter, then the volume label hit enter, confirm [Y] hit enter. All logical drives will be deleted in the Extended DOS Partition hit Escape then hit escape again and you should be back at “FDISK Options”

Deleting Extended DOS Partition
At the FDISK Options screen
Enter choice [3]
“3. Delete partition or Logical DOS Drive” and hit enter

At the screen “Delete DOS Partition or Logical DOS Drive”
Enter choice: [2]
“2. Delete Extended DOS Partition.” hit enter
Confirm [Y] hit enter, press escape, now our extended DOS Drive is gone.

Deleting Primary DOS Partition
At the FDISK Options screen
Enter Choice [3]
“3. Delete partition or Logical DOS Drive” hit enter

At the screen “Delete DOS Partition or Logical DOS Drive”
Enter Choice [1]
“1. Delete Primary DOS Partition” hit enter
Note below how Fdisk is referring to the partitions as numbers and not letters
At the warning ensure the correct partition is selected [1] hit enter
Enter the volume label ………… [ ] hit enter
Confirm [Y] hit enter, press escape
Now at the FDISK Options screen
Enter choice [4] hit enter and you should see “No partitions defined”
We now have a clean Hard disk hit escape.

Create Primary DOS Partition
At the FDISK Options screen
Enter choice [1]
“1. Create DOS partition or Logical DOS Drive” hit enter

At the screen “Create DOS Partition or Logical DOS Drive
Enter choice [1]
“1. Create Primary DOS Partition” hit enter. Wait while it verifies drive integrity.
If you only want to have one partition answer [Y] hit enter then skip ahead to the step “After completion of Partitioning”
(With only one partition the partition is automatically set as active)

If you want to have more partitions answer [N] hit enter. Wait while it verifies drive integrity
Type in the size partition that you want (Don’t use % you can make a mistake when you get to the Logical DOS Drives) hit enter and press escape.

At the FDISK Options screen
Enter choice [2]
“2.Set active partition” hit enter
(Only the Primary DOS Partition is made active)
Type the number of the partition you want to make active [1] and hit enter then press escape.

Create Extended DOS Partition and extended DOS Drives
At the FDISK Options screen
Enter choice [1]
“1. Create DOS partition or Logical DOS Drive” hit enter

At the screen “Create DOS Partition or Logical DOS Drive
Enter choice [2]
“2.Create Extended DOS Partition” hit enter. Wait while it verifies drive integrity then leave the default size (maximum) and hit enter then press escape

At the “Create Logical DOS Drive(s) in the Extended DOS Partition” screen
If you only want a Primary partition C: and one logical DOS Drive D: then leave the default size as it is and hit enter then press escape Skip ahead to the step “After completion of Partitioning”
If you want a Primary partition C: and two logical DOS Drives D: & E: read on

Create two logical DOS Drives (D: & E: )
At the “Create Logical DOS Drive(s) in the Extended DOS Partition” screen, in the step above, type the size for your logical DOS Drive (this will be your second drive D: ) hit enter Wait while it verifies drive integrity. leave the remaining space shown unless you want to create more logical DOS Drives (this will be your last drive E: ) hit enter then escape.

After completion of Partitioning
At the FDISK Options screen
Enter choice [4] hit enter
Check that the partitions are what you want; answer [Y] and hit enter to check the logical DOS Drive(s)
Then press escape until you get to the A: prompt (this is what they mean by shutting down windows) then reboot your computer with Control + Alt + Delete or reset
It is important to reboot to maintain your drive letter assignments!

Formatting
With your floppy still as your first boot device, boot up with your Win98
Boot disk in your floppy drive, make sure “1.Start computer with CD-ROM support” is highlighted. (This is necessary for when you install Win98)
At the A: prompt type “format C: /s” without the Quotes. The “/s” is only used on the C: drive it puts system files on it.
Confirm with a Y, hit enter.
At the end of formatting you can type a label for you disk, I prefer to keep things simple and leave it blank, hit enter.

Now format your other drives with the commands at the A: prompt “format D:” without the quotes, again confirm Y, hit enter again you have the choice of a label as above then format your E: drive the same way with “format E:” hit enter
Installing Win98
(You don’t have to reboot after Formatting provided you have booted with CD-Rom support)
Now we have to be aware of our CD-ROM Drive letter, this is where it can become confusing because our boot floppy has loaded information into RAM and this becomes a temporary “RAM Drive” and is assigned a temporary Drive letter so in the case of our setup where we formatted our hard drive with three partitions our drive letters will be:
C: Primary partition
D: Second partition
E: Third partition
F: RAM Drive
G: CD-ROM
You will see the CD-ROM has been moved one letter further on. This will be confirmed if you look at your screen two lines back from you’re A: prompt you will see “Drive X: =Driver MSCD001” or “Driver X: =Driver OEMCD001”.
Where “X” is the temporary drive letter of your CD-ROM
At the A: “prompt type “X:” (Your CD-Rom drive letter) without the quotes hit enter then at your CD-Rom drive letter prompt type “setup” without the quotes and follow the instructions on your screen.

If your Win98 CD is self booting it is quite easy, you just make sure your CDROM is the first boot device in your Bios and boot up with your Win98 CD in the drive. You would have rebooted to change your first boot device so your “RAM Drive” would be cleared from memory and your CD-Rom drive letter would be as it is normally.
At your CD-Rom drive letter prompt type “setup” without the quotes and follow the instructions on your screen.