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Hello,
I have been provided with a ghost image of a 548 MB disk drive that originally contained 3 partitions. This image was created as a bitstream copy to get the unallocated space, etc. I have a 1.7GB hard disk that I am trying to restore this image to. However, when I restore it, I can see all 3 partitions from Windows or the Windows DOS shell. But when I try to access it from pure DOS, I can only see the 1st partition. The other 2 partitions are not known to DOS. Can anyone tell me what I am doing wrong so I can get to the other partitions from within DOS? I am using Ghost 9.0. Any help is sure appreciated. Thanks in advance! -Brad
P.S. The 'target' drive that I am restoring to was prepared using fdisk as a single primary partition, then formatted. I have also tried using fdisk to define it as 3 partitions before restore, but the results were the same.
What Win version are you useing and what DOS version ?
Run Fdisk (from 98 or ME) option #4 what type of partition is displayed ?
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Please bear in mind that pure dos may not be able to see discs and/or partitions that are formatted different to fat16 (e.g. fat32 or ntfs)
I suspect this is why Top Farmer is asking the above questions.
FDISK from W2000 can provide info asto fomatting method used.
Good Luck - Keep us posted.
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Thanks for the quick response! Here is the specifics on versions etc:
The image was created by a machine using Win98 2nd edition. The drive that was imaged was a Conner 540 MB drive, 1048 cylinders, 16 heads, and 63 sectors per track.
The machine that I am restoring to it is a Win98 machine, but I am booting it and using it in pure DOS. The fdisk entry shows my target drive as having 2 partitions. The 1st is PRI DOS, FAT16, and 401 mbytes. The 2nd is EXT DOS, 115 Mbytes, and has no entry under system. When I used fdisk, I only defined 1 partition, so I guess fdisk made this second one itself. Also, just in case it matters, the specifics on the target drive are 3309 cylinders, 16 Heads, and 63 Sectors per track.
Again, once I restore the image to this drive, I can see and access it fine from Windows or Windows DOS shell, but if I try to access the 2nd or 3rd partition (drive letter), the prompt comes back with "Invalid Drive Specification".
Thanks, Brad
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Oops, I didn't proofread good enough before hitting "submit". The last paragraph should have read:
Again, once I restore the image to this drive, I can see and access all partitions fine from Windows or Windows DOS shell, but if I try to access the 2nd or 3rd partition (drive letters e & f) from standalone DOS, the prompt comes back with "Invalid Drive Specification".
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If you can see it in windows or dos shell then it seems that they may have not been formatted fat16 but as fat32 which dos6 cannot read. Check by checking the partition allocation by using fdisk to read the partitions.
The clue is image was created with Win98SE.
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Hello blbrown,
First question, what can you see from Windows DOS Shell? Go there, then at the C:\ prompt, type “E:”, then enter, should show the prompt for the E drive. If so, then type “dir”, then enter. Are you really seeing anything? Do the same thing for the F drive. If you do not have (see) anything, let go to MS-DOS prompt, not the command prompt under windows.
You said that you had a 1.7GB hard drive. Lets do the “Fdisk” thing again. Menu item 4 and you said you got a PRI DOS, FAT16, 401MB Drive (C?) and a 115 MB EXT DOS Drive. 40l plus 115 does not equal a 1700MG drive. Is this a typo on the 115? You should also see some information such as “Total disk space is 1700 Mbtes (1 Mybte=1048576 bytes)
You should see a message “The extend DOS Partition contains Logical DOS Drives. Do you want to display the logical drive information (Y/N)...?(Y)”
The logical DOS drive would normally be your D, E, etc. drive. The expended partition is just the space to create logical drives. If no logical drives, you will have to create them.
Review: (a) Create a primary drive (C), make it active, (b) create a extended drive for the balance of the drive space, (c) within the extended partition, create the logical drive, D, E and so forth. Then be sure that your format the logical drives. If I reading you correctly, you already have formatted the C Drive, don’t format the C Drive again or you will delete all data on it.
If you have an extended partition (of 115 Mbytes) and no logical drives, you should delete the extended partition and use the balance of the hard drive. From the Fdisk Option screen, choose 3, and then press ENTER. The Delete DOS Partition or Logical DOS Drive screen appears. Chose 2, and then pres ENTER, The Delete Extended DOS Partition screen appears. To delete the extended MS-DOS partition, press Y, and then press ENTER.
Now recreate the extended partition, then the logical drives, etc.
CoffeeBreak
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At this time the only reason that I can think of for Win or Win dos being able to see the partitions when pure dos can not (and only if you are booting to the drive) is in the old comp a boot overlay was needed. If you are booting to that drive does it say anything about a boot overlay or gives you an option to boot to floppy ?
as per CoffeeBreak post "You should see a message “The extend DOS Partition contains Logical DOS Drives. Do you want to display the logical drive information (Y/N)...?(Y)”
do you get that display ? Run fdisk in a dos window and pure dos - is there a difference?
Due that you are useing a disk image useing fdisk to make partitions is of no value, they would be overwritten and new one made as the old image required. I think that the image would include the MBR and VBRs ?
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As you suspected above, the disk was showing as FAT32. To try to change this, I found that if I answer "no" to the fdsisk prompt asking if I want to enable large support, then the disk formats to FAT16. However, the same problem remains: From Win shell I can see all three partitions just fine. But when I go to DOS, I can see only the first partition. If I try to enter e: or f:, I get an "Invalid Drive Specification" error.
Also, I haven't seen the message saying " Do you want to display the logical drive information (Y/N)...?(Y)" but I wm looking for it.
I double checked and the 401MB PRI DOS and 115MB EXT DOS is indeed what fdisk is showing. However at the bottom of the screen is says that total disk space is 1626MB. When I first fdisk the drive, I chose to use max space as Primary DOS drive (is that correct??). It then shows the PRI DOS as 1626 MB. Then I format the drive, and it formats it as a 1626 MB drive. When I try to restore the image, that is when it seems to change to 400 MB and 115 MB. As a matter of fact, the 3 partitions on the image are 400MB, 100MB, and 15MB respectively, so it sounds like it is allocating the 1st 400 MB partition correctly, and then lumping the 2nd and 3rd partitions together in DOS mode.
By the way, I am restoring this image as D:, E:, & F: drives. When I look at fdisk, the 400 MB PRI Dos partition has a D: beside it, and I can indeed access this in DOS. The other partition, the 115MB one, has no drive letter beside it. I am going to try to assign a drive letter to it to see if that changes anything.
Next I am going to try that sequence suggested above. by the way, I really do appreciate all the input from you guys!!!
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If you can see the partitions in FAT32 then you should use a WIN98 boot disk and run Ghost to restore them to another hard drive. After you have restored them then you can copy the data to a hard drive with FAT16 partitions.
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