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Micron Millenia computer. Recently lost access to my D: partition on my hard drive. 3.1GB EIDE drive partitioned FAT32, 2/3 to C and 1/3 to D. No recent software installs. (Most recent was NAV2003). After click on D icon in "My Computer" get the following message: "D not accessable. A device attached to the system is not functioning". No access to D partition from DOS either. Tried formatting D also ... message said D didn't exist.
Any ideas? Is my hard drive about to fail? ... it is 7 years old. Computer still works, but my effective hard drive space has been reduced to 2.1GB.
Any opinions on good external backup device so I don't need multiple floppies (I have USB ports). Anyone know max (if any) hard drive I can install w/ WIN98 if I have to replace. Need new HD controller card too?
Thanks.
Run fdisk, Y to large disk support, then option 4. Post back information on the extended partition. Does it contain a virtual drive?
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Thanks for your offer to help DAVEINCAPS.
Here is the FDISK info:
Current fixed drive : 1
Partition Status Type Volume Label
C:1 A PRIDOS MICRON
2 EXTDOSMBYTES SYSTEM USAGE
2047 FAT32 68%
969 32%
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At the bottom of that screen does it say:
The extended dos partition contains logical dos drives.
Do you want to display the logical drive info (Y/N)If it does say that then hit Y and post back what it says.
If it doesn't say that then I think you've lost the drive in the extended partition. Hit ESC to get back to the main fdisk page and choose option 1 and on the next page choose option 3 to create a logical drive. Then exit fdisk and see if you can now format d:
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Looks like my last response didn't post.
Before I read your last note, I (per advice from a computer tech at work)
- booted from WIN98 startup diskette
- did a SYS on my c: drive
- installed WIN98 to a new directory
(i.e., clean install w/o formating
drive first)My d: partition is now usable again (though I have to reinstall all my apps). New problem:
Right click on d: in My Computer and choose properties ... reports that d: partition is 1TB in size (1000 GB) vs. its real size of 1GB. Will this give me a problem down the road? Other wise d: partition works fine (copy, paste, open, save files all work).
C: partition info reports its correct size (2GB).
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That's an odd one. I'd think a misreported size may be a problem. I wonder if that may have been the reason you lost the partition before.
Run scandisk on it and see if that corrects it.
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Tried to scan disk and it wouldn't work.
And I am now back to original "D not accessable. A device attached to the system is not functioning". Not sure if scan disk caused it though. Computer had just finished a Norton Antivirus system scan.Reran ... FDISK, Y, 4 ... gives same info as before ... and no text re: a logical drive.
Partition Status Type Volume label
C:1 A PRIDOS MICRON
2 EXTDOSMBYTES SYSTEM USAGE
2047 FAT32 68%
969 32%FDISK recognizes the correct size at least.
If I perform the FDISK; 1; 3 you suggested above, will I lose my C: partition info? Might rather live with a 2GB drive for awhile rather than reinstalling all the apps again. Any 3rd party software that will lower the risk of losing the c: partition info?
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The only way fdisk could cause you to lose a partition is if you use option 3 'delete partition or logical dos drive'.
If you have norton disk doctor you might run that. It's a litte better at catching partition problems than scandisk.
Did you use fdisk when you originally partitioned it? Or are you using a drive overlay?
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Thanks for the help ... going to move important files to a removable drive first, just to be safe.
The original partition was there, I believe, when I bought the computer (so long ago -don't remember FDISKing it myself).
Computer was set up by Micron (Jan 1997) w/ FAT16 (WIN95 installed) ... if I remember correctly, FAT16 couldn't handle partitions over 2GB. Converted to FAT32 a year or so later w/ utility that came with my upgrade to WIN98. Safe to assume Micron would have used FDISK? ... not a drive overlay?
I'd actually like to get rid of the partition (make it one 3GB drive) once it is safe to do so. I guess I'll need something like Partition Magic to do that if I don't want to lose my files.
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If there was an overlay, an option would come up something like 'press CTRL for boot options' after a message indicating the overlay had loaded.
I asked because I was going to suggest you try:
fdisk/mbr
to refresh the master boot record. Some software like overlays can change the MBR and running the above command would erase that info. Norton sometimes puts stuff there too.
PartitionMagic should be able to merge the 2 partitions although I've never used it.
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