Maxtor 60gig problem

BruceYBruceY S. Jersey
edited August 2003 in Hardware
Maxtor 60 gig ATA100 hard drive
Gigabyte dual bios MOBO ATA60 about a year old

I had installed this drive along with the included PCI ATA 100 card. Then installed Win2k.....no problem....that was last year. This year , the owner wants a dual boot system for some older program he likes. No problem , I've done this dual boot setup about 3 times now..................BUT Now my problem
I couldnt recall IF I had to use the MaxBlast software that came with the drive. MaxBlast is one of those programs that "tricks" older bios to see big drives. I must have installed it last year for I saw a 8/02 listing while in the program, along with my multiple 7/14/03 installs THIS time around.
What I cant do is format ( and not sure my partitioning attempts are good) this drive. CMOS setup finds the drive correctly either way, if hooked up to card OR directly to MOBO. The Format command gives me... Abort, Retry,Fail drive not (ready)?
Trying to install Win98. First I"ve "lossed" my wonderful WIn98 boot disk that went right into the setup file on the CD. Any how, now I bootup with a Win98 Startup disk, log onto the CD drive, type SETUP..enter.......and it hangs. Windows blue sctreen briefly flashes and then message "Windows needs......." something about mb. Already tried switching with different Cd......same result.
I'm wondering if MaxBlast is messing up the partition,format and install of windows. I did mention while in MaxBlast, I saw 2 dates of 8/02 and now about 5 for 7/14/03. What this was a listing of the times it was installed, or removed. I can pick (sort of like restore) a date and try but NO luck there either.
I have as of 2/14@11pm , removed the cmos battery and pulled the power cord. I'll leave it out till tomarrow, that will be close to 24 hours with no juice. Hopefull, probley wrong, It will forget? And I'll have better luck...worked with a pc and a forgotten CMOS password.
Does MaxBlast install someplace on the harddrive? I thought I had the drive parted out to 5,10,20,25 gigs. I thought parting out erased ALL on HD? Already did a FDISK/MBR........Not sure in what order now with everything else I've done. Is a "Low Level Format" better/different? Would it get rid of my MaxBlast history/data? Does it do something to the cmos/bios? MOBO has a dual bios.........would switching over to other help out? This is such an easy thing to do. Last one I did was with Win 3.11 and 2K Thank You BruceY

Comments

  • AgeekAgeek
    edited July 2003
    Um.... So, tomorrow-- when CMOS battry is back in (better, stick a new one in), run the MaxBlast and run the Diags and not the low level yet. See if the Diags can find the drive, and can say it is good or bad-- if good, you actually might end up wiping as the preboot if you installed it changed the location of part tabel begin point and stuck a part tabel in that FDisk then used. Unless must have data, this is a REAL PITA to fix if you must have what is there now.

    While 98 cannot handle more than 80 GB, 98 SE can handle drives bigger if part sizes are limited, and it will not see Win2K at all-- nor will 98's fdisk work on a part table that has been worked on by Win2K easily with a multiboot resulting from results. Easiest way to do what you want to do is to partition with PM8 (Partition Magic 8.0). It can also error check partitions if you have a set of PM8 rescue floppies or can CD boot the box into PM8(the CD is bootable).

    Make sure that any data needed eiterh is long dead or is recovered, and seeif your customer needs anything real bad before working on with PM8 as if it fails and it locks the part table the drive does get to be wiped with tools on the MaxBlast floppy in such a way that nothing gets retrieved. TECHNICALLY, if you stick olg on first in a part theat is a size it can handle, then run a 2000 Pro install the Pro should offer to multiboot or at least let you edit its boot.ini and then you can multiboot from within Win2K.

    PM8 also comes with Boot Magic.

    John Danielson.
  • TexTex Dallas/Ft. Worth
    edited July 2003
    Have you tried to just partiton and format with yoru win98 boot floppy? As long as it sees the drive correctly you should NOT use maxblast B.S. software. If your using a included ata100 card IT should see the drive correctly.

    The question really in my mind anyway is whether or not the system will boot from the included card and that the computer bios is set to boot from the included card etc.. If this is a modern MB then try putting the drive on the normal IDE header and not on the included card. From there boot from the win98 boot disk and try fdisk and partiton it then format there. You don't by any chance have a win2k or winxp boot cd do ya? If so use IT to boot and partiton (dlete any exsiting partitons) then format the disk with fat32 then kill the install and boot from the win98 boot floppy and install win xp from there. Getting rid of that max-blast nonsense can be frustrating at times. Its only needed in very old MB's that couldn't see a 60gb drive correctly. Most anything made in the last 4 years or so anyway can see them fine thru LBA in the bios.

    Tex
  • BruceYBruceY S. Jersey
    edited July 2003
    I know this doesnt make any obvious sense. After 48 hours with board battery AND power plug removed, I reinstalled both and fired it up to "see" what would happen. "NO OS INSTALLED", cool I thought. With boot disk I was able to format and install Win98. Running pretty good, but windows only sees 2gig of the 60 gig HD. CMOS setup does see the full 60gig though, hopefully just a dos thing. Will let ya know when I install 2K what happens. THANK YOU FOR YOUR HELP
    BruceY:D
  • BruceYBruceY S. Jersey
    edited August 2003
    UPDATE: ALL RUNNING LIKE A RAPED APE, DUAL BOOT RUNNING GREAT....NO PROBLEMS
    THANK YOU FOR YOUR HELP
    BRUCE
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