I want to run a Maxtor hardisk utility from windows, the utility is reporting that it won't run as long a s LILO is active. How can I temporarily disable LILO? thanks

I don't know that you can as it has written to the MBR of the drive, instaed of trying it through windowz can you run the util from booting of the CD ? What util is it ? Keep the old stuff running

mxblast4windows - a maxtor utility. If I boot straight into the utility I don't think I will be able to see the drive I want to zero fill -which is an external USB drive.

ZEROFILL / WIPEDISK should work for you... Maybe try a link from the page below: http://www.thefreecountry.com/secur... There is a way to zerofill with the dd command in Linux just be aware that if you point the command to the wrong drive it is BYE BYE to everything on it.... Keep the old stuff running

yes quite! Although I have Linux on my machine I haven't yet used it - I am less than a newbie, that's why I want to perform the operation through windoze.

Ok then foreget dd for now as it can be a monster if done wrong, there are a few different ways to go from here, have you considered the links I posted before, or how about this method, remove the drive you have everything on and put the one you want to work on as the primary master, boot from the CD and run the util from there... Keep the old stuff running

There is no way to disable Lilo temporarily, but you can uninstall it, then reinstall it after doing what you need to do with the Maxtor utility. The first step is to make a boot floppy for your Mandrake Linux installation. Boot into Mandrake. If you run the GUI, switch to a terminal Display (CTRL+ALT+F2). Log in as root (user name = root, enter root password). Put a blank floppy disk in the floppy drive. Run the following command: mkbootdisk --device /dev/fd0 Follow any prompts. Enter reboot to reboot your computer to make sure your boot floppy works. Note: You will switch to a terminal display, log in as root, and reboot your computer several times in this procedure, but I will not repeat the above information for brevity's sake. If the boot floppy works (you should be back in Mandrake Linux now), the next step is to remove lilo from the MBR. Switch to a terminal display as you did before, and log in as root. Run the following command: lilo -u Reboot the computer (make sure the Mandrake boot disk is removed from the floppy drive). You should now boot into Windows as you did before installing Linux. Do the work you need to do. Use the Mandrake boot disk to get back into Mandrake. Switch to a terminal display yet again. Log in as root. Run the following command: lilo Remove the Mandrake boot disk and reboot the computer. You should now have the lilo boot menu back. HTH, Ernie Registered Linux User 247790 ICQ 41060744