How to remove EXT DOS partition?

Topic

New Reply

I was given an old system that had (I think) Windows NT installed and now I want to reformat the hard drive – and install Win98 therefore getting rid of any information that might have still been on the disk, but I cannot seem to get rid of the EXT DOS partition. I tried using fdisk from DOS (not MS-DOS prompt) and I’m getting the merry run-around trying to get rid of that EXT DOS partition.
The options that come up are

1. Create DOS partition or Logical DOS Drive
2. Set active partition
3. Delete partition or Logical Drive
4. Display partition information

I select 4 and it displays:

Partition Status   Type   Volume Label     Mbytes   System Usage
C:1          A    PRI DOS                    299   FAT16    10%
  2               EXT DOS                   2737            89%

I select 3
Which then displays:

1. Delete Primary Dos Partition
2. Delete Extended DOS Partition
3. Delete Logical Dos Drive(s) in the Extended DOS Partition
4. Delete Non-DOS Partition

If I select 1 – it says “Cannot Delete Primary DOS Partition on drive 1 when an Extended DOS Partition exists”
If I select 2 – it says “Cannot delete Extended DOS Partition while logical drive exist”
If I select 3 – it says “No logical drives defined All logical drives deleted in the Extended DOS Partition”
If I select 4 – it says “No Non-DOS Partition to delete”

With only 299 MB – I cannot really get much of anything to load, let alone re-partition the drive…

The difference between Genius and Stupidity:
A Genius knows their limits.
- Albert Einstein

Reply | Quote

Replies

Try assigning a drive letter and formatting the extended DOS partition. Then attempt to delete it.

If that fails, I’d go for the jugular (so to speak) and get a low-level format utility from the drive manufacturer (popular ones of course include Maxtor and Western Digital). If you do this, make sure you get the correct utility; different models may have different utilities and this is not something that you want to take chances with.

Reply | Quote

Any possibility that your system had Linux installed? I had a very similar problem when I went to remove Linux from my PC. FDISK may recognise that there is a partition in the extended drive without being able to either see or delete it . If you think there may have been Linux, possibly as dual boot with NT, you will need either a LInux setup disc or a disc management utility, such as Partition Magic, to delete the Linux ext2 partition.

Reply | Quote

It is possible that in a prior life it had a dual boot – I really do not know it’s history – I only know that FDISK sees the EXT DOS partition but cannot delete it. I would love to be able to load Partition Magic, but do not have enough space – requres 57M, only have 18M avail , perhaps I’ll format the 299M piece and see if I can load a version of Win9x that won’t suck up all of the space I have, then see if I have enough room for Partition Magic. If that does not work I will give the low-level format a go. If that won’t work and push comes to shove – I’ll just replace the HD – they’re not that expensive but I would like to save my for other goodies!

The difference between Genius and Stupidity:
A Genius knows their limits.
- Albert Einstein

Reply | Quote

It’s a pretty small drive, anyway. I’d consider having a second drive, especially if there’s any chance of wanting to put music on it.

Reply | Quote

pretty small – don’t really need too much – most of the stuff that I’m evaluating is under 500M – and according to da boss – NO MUSIC! !

The difference between Genius and Stupidity:
A Genius knows their limits.
- Albert Einstein

Reply | Quote

Spoilsport .

Reply | Quote

Don’t know why I didn’t think of it straight away (probably because I have no experience of NT), but the extended partition will have been defined into logical drives with NTFS, which DOS can’t see. If you don’t have PartitionMagic, Ranish Partition Manager is to download from http://www.users.intercom.com/~ranish/part/ . Will deal with NTFS, but no good for ext2.

Reply | Quote

Thanks – I’ll give it a try later tonight – been rather hectic around here for the last couple of days – what with no aircraft traffic to get our people from where they are to where they’re needed! Looks like that is clearing up now – but very slowly. Time for the world to reflect on what happened, and find a way to prevent it from happening in the future – one country cannot do the job – but the world can!

The difference between Genius and Stupidity:
A Genius knows their limits.
- Albert Einstein

Reply | Quote

Hope things get back to some semblance of normality soon. As to what happens to safeguard the future…I just hope that this doesn’t lead to some kind of anti-Islam/Arab backlash. There is too much of that sort of prejudice in that respect already. The culprits and those that harbour them must be punished, but let’s be sure that we get the right people (‘we’ hopefully being a coalition of all peoples of all nationalities and faiths). Having lived all over the world, including the Middle East, we are all one race with more in common than we have differences. Unfortunately, one thing we have in common is that minority of crazy fanatics in our midst.

Reply | Quote

[indent]

---

Unfortunately, one thing we have in common is that minority of crazy fanatics in our midst.

---

[/indent] Sad but true!
On a more pleasant side – thanks for pointing me to Ranish Partition Manager – that did the trick and got rid of the pesky EXT DOS partition (it WAS NTFS – now FAT32!)

The difference between Genius and Stupidity:
A Genius knows their limits.
- Albert Einstein

Reply | Quote

Nice to have a bit of good news this week!

Reply | Quote

I know – just went brain-dead trying to get this doorstop running – I really don’t need it that much – just trying to get another platform for testing various configurations of hardware/software. Thanks for waking me up…

The difference between Genius and Stupidity:
A Genius knows their limits.
- Albert Einstein

Reply | Quote