I have a dual Hard Disk installation with my normal XP installation on C: and a second minimal XP installation on D:While booted from C: I wish to make a full backup of the D: drive, such that I in time can revert easily to this installation after format D, or perhaps install it on a new hard disk.I intend to save it on a sub directory on C: for compression and burning on a DVD.How can I most simply do this? Would a simple file copy get everything as I have not booted from the D: drive, there should not be any locked files?If not, what would work?Would XP backup get everything?Any freeware programs that would work?I am sure Norton Ghost would do it, but don't want to spend dollars if I can avoid it.
a friend asked me to install a new hard drive for him because his crashed. So i purchased a new hard drive (maxtor 60 gb) set out to partition and format the drive, using a win 98 boot disk. I partitoned the drive ( for large volume drive.) Formatted the drive ( format c: /s ) to include system files.and proceeded with Os install Windows 2000. Everything went as smooth as silk... the when install finished, I was prompted to remove the disk from cd rom and complete installation with the onscreen prompt. I removed disk, clicked finish and the computer rebooted upon loading, when it went to start windows it said DISK BOOT FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK AND PRESS ENTER
I put the Win 2K disc back in and hit enter. It started windows perfectly no errors at all... then I took disk out re-started ( to check system stability) and back to the same error message: DISK BOOT FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK AND PRESS ENTER. I of course freaked out, I feel like an idiot cause I cant get this thing to work right. tried reformatting without the sytem files, re-partioning tried win 98, winXP, nothing same stuff! So I talked to a pal got a hard drive wipe program off the net "killdisk", wiped the drive and tried to reinstall Win 2K, same problem.
Yeah I have reformatted my hard drives a few times over the years so I am no stranger to it however I am just curious about something. When I go to reformat with my DELL Windows XP Home Edition CD I will then revert back to SP1. I have SP3 installed onto my computer right now. I also have a SP2 CD I got from Microsoft about 3 years ago or so. Should I first install the SP2 cd or is there no need to do that seeing SP3 should have all of SP2 updates in it?
I have Win XP home installed as OEM software on the C drive of my PC. I also have this OS as a Norton Ghost file supplied with the PC as a "Recovery CD". I have installed a second hard drive designated "D" This all works fine. I wish to install Win 2000 (which I have on a Microsoft cd) on the second HD. I would then hope at boot - up to be given the choice of which OS to load. Can anyone tell me what is the simplest way to do this?
If I want to attach second hard disk with the same configuration of master hard disk, then system doesn't show second hard disk altogether or new hard disk begin to malfunction. Such as suddenly begin to give sounds like TICK, TICK TICK. Suddenly vanishes from the 'MY COMPUTER' drives. Suddenly denies to copy paste functions. BIOS shows both SATA drives. But Win XP doesn't load or simply hangs while starting up [booting up]. It happens when I attach second SATA drive with system. If only one SATA is attached, then WIN XP boots normally.
I am trying to install a second copy of XP Pro on my system. I have the first installation on my first hard disc which is partition C: . I have another hard disc which has two partitions D: and Z:. D: has my data and Z: (20gb) is going to be for testing programs and settings and such without installing them on my main disc.
I loaded my XP Pro CD into the optical drive and went through the menus to install a new OS on partition Z. I did a quick format of partition Z in NTFS format. Installation proceeded and the computer rebooted just like usual. Then as it got to the preparing windows installation screen it froze. Just stopped. I restarted and it tried to resume but would freeze immediately again. I checked the boot.ini file and it is just like it should be. With both OS listed. I tried doing this three times and I got the same results each time. My original OS still works fine. I am considering completely reformating the partition and removing all traces of the installatiuon from the boot.ini file but if anyone has any other ideas that are easier I would like to know.
I am having to reinstall XP - the setup starts and then reformats the hard drive. After it has done that it won't start the program installation it just keeps looping and reformatting the hdd
recently bought SATA 3.0 hard disk(samsung)and i forgot if my motherboard support this hard disk,after checking it only supports 1.5 SATA.I visited samsung website on how to force my Hard disk to run at 1.5
Is it possible to dual boot between to different hard drives both running Windows XP? I just bought a new hard drive and I want to install it on the same machine and have a drive just for me and my wife and the kids can have their own. They down load so much stuff and cause the system to boot and run so slow. I'm tired of restoring it just to find 2 weeks later it's like it was.
I currently have 2 x 250GB hard drives; the first with XP and Vista on separate partitions, and the second for data/media. Is it safe to restore an OS disk image without removing the partitions i.e. restoring an XP disk image back to its original partition whilst keeping the Vista partition intact. I'm trying to find a safe/efficient way of backing up my OS's by saving disk images to an external hard drive, so if something goes wrong, ie doesn't boot, I can restore an image via the other OS.
I have created a Bart PE bootable XP cd. I can boot into windows using this CD I would like to know how to copy the data in my hard disk to pen drive or flash drive.
It says that TOTAL SIZE = 39 GB And Free Space = 5 GB Which means that the size of all files on C is 34 GB But when I select all files including Hidden files and Right Click> Properties, its size of all files is only 27 GB.I did clear recycle bin and disk defragmenter C, but still the same. So why is that?
I am cloning my existing hard drive in my laptop (sata) to an external hard drive (pata) in preparation for installing a new larger hard drive (sata)in the laptop. Can I, or how do I transfer the cloned data from the external (pata) to the new internal hard drive (sata)? Thanks in advance and I apoligize if this is a rudimentary question as this is my first time attempting something like this.
I can not access hard disk properties because Windows Explorer hangs whenever I Right click on a hard drive icon. I am running WXP pro SP2 completely up to date with updates.
Recently I installed Ubuntu Linux on a partition on my secondary hard drive (it's a worthwhile education, I'll give it that). Since then, when in Windows, the remaining space, used for games, alternates between being accessible and being unaccessible. What's the go?For example, when I go in My Computer and try to open D: drive this is the message i receive:D: is not accessible The parameter is incorrect.
I have a computer at home with two identical 160 GB WD SATAII drives in it and I want a copy of XP on each drive. The first drive (Which I have been using as my gaming computer) has already got XP installed and I want to keep it pretty much free of anything but games so it won't affect performance. On the second drive, I would like to install another copy of XP and use this drive for my common use and with the primary intent of using it for a HDTV capture device. I've researched it for a while and have almost only been able to find information concerning dual booting with IDE drives using a jumper switching device so you don't have to dismantle the computer every time you switch drives.
if someone could tell me how to format windows xp home edition from the bios and not using the xp disk. I have already tried right clicking on drive c and selecting format but the message says windows cannot format this drive. Quit any disk utilities or other programs that are using this drive, and make sure that no window is displaying the contents of the drive. Then try formatting again.
So I closed all open programs that I could but still no luck. Then I tried the format from running the run command and typing format c:but I get this message format cannot run because the volume is in use by another process. Format can run if this volume is dismounted first. All open handles to this volume would then be invalid. would you like to force a dismount on this volume? (y/n) so I type y for yes and hit enter then nothing
I upgraded my server, basically all I kept was the two hard drives from the old machine. The one hard drive is for the system files (~13GB) and the other is for storage, user files, etc (~160GB). I figured that then I reinstalled Windows 2000 Server on the System disk, I would just have to assign the other disk a drive letter and be on my way. Instead, in the disk management console, I get "Disk 1 [the 160GB) Dynamic Unreadable" I can revert to a basic disk, but it says I will lose all my information. It is imperative that the data on this disk be recovered.
Can anybody point me to the instructions about how to install XP Pro to a single Win98 hard drive - to make it dual boot, like Win 2k? I've been looking all around the internet and the only thing I've found is an XP dual boot on a 2nd hard drive.
I have Windows XP home edition already installed on my system and I for some reasons I want to reinstall them on a different hard drive (I have 2 IDE drives). It is very important that my initial windows setup, the one I am running on now, will be working after the new installation too. Is that possible?
I am facing two problems with my lap top hp campac presario 2100. 1.The loptops battery to be changed. I dont know how many batteries are there. Any cmos battery there like any other pc. Pl advice. What would be the cost. and the model number . The hard disk requires replacement. I want to know the model numberor exact type of hard disk would be fit in. and the cost thereof.3. Windows xp home edition has been preloaded in the laptop. How to take a copy of the os and copy in the new hard disk. I have the serial number etc for the OS.
Last week i installed windows XP Pro on my desktop. It has a 250GB hard drive which has 1 partition (C drive only), NTFS offcourse. I did not format it while installing windows as it has lots of stuff in it. There's over 50GB free and i�ve been removing a lot of stuff from the hard drive to make up some space but in windows i get an error message that i don't have enough disk space, the disk cleanup utility runs cant free up space and i can not install or copy anything in the hard drive. I've noticed that when i deleted some file holding (or not) the shift key the free size goes lower although the files are being deleted from the hard disk.
Hey, have built a new pc, but am using the same hd as my old one, when booting i get a "disk boot failure insert system disk and press enter" however when i press enter it boots up, not really a big problem just annoying and i wonderd if anyone could help get rid of it.
my dad's hard drive crashed and so he has just bought another, now he needs to reinstall Windows XP Home but unfortunately he doesnt have a disk as its an HP machine and a disc was never supplied, the operating system was already on the computer and the option of making a recovery disc was available but he never actually undertook that option So he needs to get Windown back on his computer, he has the serial sticker on the side of his machine, he rang up HP and they said the machine is not in warranty - they cant send him a replacement disc
I always have errors reported on my hard drive, even after chkdsk /f and /f/r."Freespace marked as allocated in the volume bitmap". Why does it never go away? Windows XP Pro with all of the updates. Machine runs fine.
I am running Windows XP Home Edition on a Compaq/Presario desktop. The XP was pre-installed and so I have no boot disks. I hope I never need it, but just as a precaution, I made a Boot disk using a freeware program "PE Builder". The process seemed to go ok, but there was a warning that "building from an OEM version of Windows can mean trouble..."
I have a Dell Dimension 2350 that I want to add a 2nd hard drive to. However when I opened it up there is no additional brackets. Can I go ahead and still put one in and have it just lay in the bottom of the case?
How do you format a new, fresh, hard drive to NTFS? Without using an XP system or installation disk? I know for old stuff you can use fdisk and format in DOS.
A couple of years ago I purchased a computer with Windows XP pre-installed. I recently had a bad crash, and corrupted my hard drive.The recovery disk does not work.I need an installation disk to reinstall my system.Can I get one from somewhere? As I understand it, if I go to a shop and buy a Win XP installation disk, I'm really paying for the licence.The disk itself is a trivial expense.I have already paid for a licence for XP. But I don't have the disk to install it.I don't want to have to buy a new copy and pay for a licence which I already own.
I have a real XP Home cd key thats really old, and I finally managed to find a real XP home (SP2) disk. i never got one with my old computer. now i just reformatted my harddrive and am trying to install it. however, the computer wont let me pass the part where i enter the key. it keeps on saying that the key is invalid
