Question about bootable drives.

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsme.general (More info?)

I notice that a person has the option of making a drive bootable or
nonbootable using FDISK. Why would a person *not* want to make a drive
bootable? If the drive doesn't have an OS on it and through some mistake
is configured in the BIOS as the first bootable drive, wouldn't the
worst that could happen be that you would get a "Non-system disk" error
message?

TIA

--
Regards from John Corliss

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsme.general (More info?)

In article <#50MIX0QFHA.3868@TK2MSFTNGP10.phx.gbl>, John Corliss says...

> I notice that a person has the option of making a drive bootable or
> nonbootable using FDISK. Why would a person *not* want to make a drive
> bootable? If the drive doesn't have an OS on it and through some mistake
> is configured in the BIOS as the first bootable drive, wouldn't the
> worst that could happen be that you would get a "Non-system disk" error
> message?

Is it "bootable" disk, or Primary DOS? I can run fdisk on my current system,
but I only used the status option. I have two physical drives. Drive 0,
which appears to the OS as "C:\", has a PRI DOS partition, Drive 1, which
has three partitions, appearing to the OS as "D:\", "E:\", and "F:\", has
EXT DOS partitions. I only use a PRI DOS partition when I expect to install
a bootable OS. If I don't expect to boot from the partition, I set it as an
EXT DOS partition. That may only apply to MSFT OSes; I've not, yet,
attempted to create a partition for a non-MSFT OS.

--
Norman
~Win dain a lotica, En vai tu ri, Si lo ta
~Fin dein a loluca, En dragu a sei lain
~Vi fa-ru les shutai am, En riga-lint

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsme.general (More info?)

John Corliss wrote:
> I notice that a person has the option of making a drive bootable or
> nonbootable using FDISK. Why would a person *not* want to make a drive
> bootable? If the drive doesn't have an OS on it and through some mistake
> is configured in the BIOS as the first bootable drive, wouldn't the
> worst that could happen be that you would get a "Non-system disk" error
> message?
>
> TIA
>

You're not making the drive bootable in FDISK, you're just setting a
flag. In order to make the drive bootable you have to move system files
to it (as well as setting the bootflag). In WindowsME there's no (easy)
way of making a bootable hard drive except by installing the whole OS.

Rick

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsme.general (More info?)

Rick T wrote:
> John Corliss wrote:
>
>> I notice that a person has the option of making a drive bootable or
>> nonbootable using FDISK. Why would a person *not* want to make a drive
>> bootable? If the drive doesn't have an OS on it and through some
>> mistake is configured in the BIOS as the first bootable drive,
>> wouldn't the worst that could happen be that you would get a
>> "Non-system disk" error message?
>>
>> TIA
>>
>
> You're not making the drive bootable in FDISK, you're just setting a
> flag. In order to make the drive bootable you have to move system files
> to it (as well as setting the bootflag). In WindowsME there's no (easy)
> way of making a bootable hard drive except by installing the whole OS.
>
> Rick

Rick,
Thanks for replying. When you say "flag", are you refering to the
Master Boot Record (MBR)? I looked and found MBR defined as:

"The first physical sector of the hard disk from which the content is
loaded to the main memory and executed by the BIOS. This code then loads
either the operating system from a hard disk partition or a more
sophisticated boot loader, such as LILO"

Is it possible for a second hard drive not to have an MBR?

--
Regards from John Corliss

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsme.general (More info?)

N. Miller wrote:

> In article <#50MIX0QFHA.3868@TK2MSFTNGP10.phx.gbl>, John Corliss says...
>
>
>>I notice that a person has the option of making a drive bootable or
>>nonbootable using FDISK. Why would a person *not* want to make a drive
>>bootable? If the drive doesn't have an OS on it and through some mistake
>>is configured in the BIOS as the first bootable drive, wouldn't the
>>worst that could happen be that you would get a "Non-system disk" error
>>message?
>
>
> Is it "bootable" disk, or Primary DOS? I can run fdisk on my current system,
> but I only used the status option. I have two physical drives. Drive 0,
> which appears to the OS as "C:\", has a PRI DOS partition, Drive 1, which
> has three partitions, appearing to the OS as "D:\", "E:\", and "F:\", has
> EXT DOS partitions. I only use a PRI DOS partition when I expect to install
> a bootable OS. If I don't expect to boot from the partition, I set it as an
> EXT DOS partition. That may only apply to MSFT OSes; I've not, yet,
> attempted to create a partition for a non-MSFT OS.

Norman, thanks very much for replying.

This subject is very confusing to me, since the instructions I found at
the Microsoft website for using FDISK and FORMAT contain so much
undefined terminology. That's not their fault, since I'm sure a certain
level of expertise has to be assumed. But in this case, the subject is a
reasonably complex one. Thus my initial question, which may not have
been the correct one.

On my system, I used FDISK on each of my two hard drives when they were
independently connected (the other was temporarily disconnected) as the
master hard drive. The main hard drive has two partitions, the backup
hard drive has only one. Both drives then have been FDISKed to have an
MBR I guess?

--
Regards from John Corliss

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsme.general (More info?)

John Corliss wrote:
> Rick T wrote:
>
>> John Corliss wrote:
>>
>>> I notice that a person has the option of making a drive bootable or
>>> nonbootable using FDISK. Why would a person *not* want to make a
>>> drive bootable? If the drive doesn't have an OS on it and through
>>> some mistake is configured in the BIOS as the first bootable drive,
>>> wouldn't the worst that could happen be that you would get a
>>> "Non-system disk" error message?
>>>
>>> TIA
>>>
>>
>> You're not making the drive bootable in FDISK, you're just setting a
>> flag. In order to make the drive bootable you have to move system
>> files to it (as well as setting the bootflag). In WindowsME there's
>> no (easy) way of making a bootable hard drive except by installing the
>> whole OS.
>>
>> Rick
>
>
> Rick,
> Thanks for replying. When you say "flag",

in FDISK, the "make partition active" flag. (I couldn't think of the
word "Active" at the time)

> are you refering to the
> Master Boot Record (MBR)? I looked and found MBR defined as:
>
> "The first physical sector of the hard disk from which the content is
> loaded to the main memory and executed by the BIOS. This code then loads
> either the operating system from a hard disk partition or a more
> sophisticated boot loader, such as LILO"
>
> Is it possible for a second hard drive not to have an MBR?
>

nope. well it's possible but then you can't use the disk.


Rick

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsme.general (More info?)

Rick T wrote:
> John Corliss wrote:
>> Rick T wrote:
>>> John Corliss wrote:
>>>
>>>> I notice that a person has the option of making a drive bootable or
>>>> nonbootable using FDISK. Why would a person *not* want to make a
>>>> drive bootable? If the drive doesn't have an OS on it and through
>>>> some mistake is configured in the BIOS as the first bootable drive,
>>>> wouldn't the worst that could happen be that you would get a
>>>> "Non-system disk" error message?
>>>>
>>>> TIA
>>>
>>> You're not making the drive bootable in FDISK, you're just setting a
>>> flag. In order to make the drive bootable you have to move system
>>> files to it (as well as setting the bootflag). In WindowsME there's
>>> no (easy) way of making a bootable hard drive except by installing
>>> the whole OS.
>>
>> Rick,
>> Thanks for replying. When you say "flag",
>
> in FDISK, the "make partition active" flag. (I couldn't think of the
> word "Active" at the time)
>
>> are you refering to the Master Boot Record (MBR)? I looked and found
>> MBR defined as:
>>
>> "The first physical sector of the hard disk from which the content is
>> loaded to the main memory and executed by the BIOS. This code then
>> loads either the operating system from a hard disk partition or a more
>> sophisticated boot loader, such as LILO"
>>
>> Is it possible for a second hard drive not to have an MBR?
>
> nope. well it's possible but then you can't use the disk.

Well, what if you have two hard drives and only one of them has an OS on
it... say you're using the second one simply for data file storage.
Would it still need an MBR?

--
Regards from John Corliss

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsme.general (More info?)

John,

The MBR command is potentially very powerful and can 'damage' your hard
drive if not used properly. Check out the following KB article first and
note the "Warnings"!!

"FDISK /MBR Rewrites the Master Boot Record"
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;69013

Also, take a look at this site about fdisk commands (including MBR)
http://www.computerhope.com/fdiskhlp.htm#01


Mart



"John Corliss" <jcorliss@fake.invalid> wrote in message
news:uRoWhRARFHA.1500@TK2MSFTNGP09.phx.gbl...
> N. Miller wrote:
>
>> In article <#50MIX0QFHA.3868@TK2MSFTNGP10.phx.gbl>, John Corliss says...
>>
>>
>>>I notice that a person has the option of making a drive bootable or
>>>nonbootable using FDISK. Why would a person *not* want to make a drive
>>>bootable? If the drive doesn't have an OS on it and through some mistake
>>>is configured in the BIOS as the first bootable drive, wouldn't the worst
>>>that could happen be that you would get a "Non-system disk" error
>>>message?
>>
>>
>> Is it "bootable" disk, or Primary DOS? I can run fdisk on my current
>> system, but I only used the status option. I have two physical drives.
>> Drive 0, which appears to the OS as "C:\", has a PRI DOS partition, Drive
>> 1, which has three partitions, appearing to the OS as "D:\", "E:\", and
>> "F:\", has EXT DOS partitions. I only use a PRI DOS partition when I
>> expect to install a bootable OS. If I don't expect to boot from the
>> partition, I set it as an EXT DOS partition. That may only apply to MSFT
>> OSes; I've not, yet, attempted to create a partition for a non-MSFT OS.
>
> Norman, thanks very much for replying.
>
> This subject is very confusing to me, since the instructions I found at
> the Microsoft website for using FDISK and FORMAT contain so much undefined
> terminology. That's not their fault, since I'm sure a certain level of
> expertise has to be assumed. But in this case, the subject is a reasonably
> complex one. Thus my initial question, which may not have been the correct
> one.
>
> On my system, I used FDISK on each of my two hard drives when they were
> independently connected (the other was temporarily disconnected) as the
> master hard drive. The main hard drive has two partitions, the backup hard
> drive has only one. Both drives then have been FDISKed to have an MBR I
> guess?
>
> --
> Regards from John Corliss

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsme.general (More info?)

Mart,
Thanks for the link. Good stuff there.

Mart wrote:
> John,
>
> The MBR command is potentially very powerful and can 'damage' your hard
> drive if not used properly. Check out the following KB article first and
> note the "Warnings"!!
>
> "FDISK /MBR Rewrites the Master Boot Record"
> http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;69013
>
> Also, take a look at this site about fdisk commands (including MBR)
> http://www.computerhope.com/fdiskhlp.htm#01
>
> John Corliss wrote:
>> N. Miller wrote:
>>> John Corliss wrote:
>>>
>>>> I notice that a person has the option of making a drive bootable or
>>>> nonbootable using FDISK. Why would a person *not* want to make a drive
>>>> bootable? If the drive doesn't have an OS on it and through some mistake
>>>> is configured in the BIOS as the first bootable drive, wouldn't the worst
>>>> that could happen be that you would get a "Non-system disk" error
>>>> message?
>>>
>>>
>>> Is it "bootable" disk, or Primary DOS? I can run fdisk on my current
>>> system, but I only used the status option. I have two physical drives.
>>> Drive 0, which appears to the OS as "C:\", has a PRI DOS partition, Drive
>>> 1, which has three partitions, appearing to the OS as "D:\", "E:\", and
>>> "F:\", has EXT DOS partitions. I only use a PRI DOS partition when I
>>> expect to install a bootable OS. If I don't expect to boot from the
>>> partition, I set it as an EXT DOS partition. That may only apply to MSFT
>>> OSes; I've not, yet, attempted to create a partition for a non-MSFT OS.
>>
>> Norman, thanks very much for replying.
>>
>> This subject is very confusing to me, since the instructions I found at
>> the Microsoft website for using FDISK and FORMAT contain so much undefined
>> terminology. That's not their fault, since I'm sure a certain level of
>> expertise has to be assumed. But in this case, the subject is a reasonably
>> complex one. Thus my initial question, which may not have been the correct
>> one.
>>
>> On my system, I used FDISK on each of my two hard drives when they were
>> independently connected (the other was temporarily disconnected) as the
>> master hard drive. The main hard drive has two partitions, the backup hard
>> drive has only one. Both drives then have been FDISKed to have an MBR I
>> guess?

--
Regards from John Corliss

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsme.general (More info?)

yes

--
Noel Paton (MS-MVP 2002-2005, Windows)

Nil Carborundum Illegitemi
http://www.btinternet.com/~winnoel/millsrpch.htm

http://tinyurl.com/6oztj

Please read http://dts-l.org/goodpost.htm on how to post messages to NG's

"John Corliss" <jcorliss@fake.invalid> wrote in message
news:OSUEzTERFHA.1476@TK2MSFTNGP09.phx.gbl...
> Rick T wrote:
>> John Corliss wrote:
>>> Rick T wrote:
>>>> John Corliss wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> I notice that a person has the option of making a drive bootable or
>>>>> nonbootable using FDISK. Why would a person *not* want to make a drive
>>>>> bootable? If the drive doesn't have an OS on it and through some
>>>>> mistake is configured in the BIOS as the first bootable drive,
>>>>> wouldn't the worst that could happen be that you would get a
>>>>> "Non-system disk" error message?
>>>>>
>>>>> TIA
>>>>
>>>> You're not making the drive bootable in FDISK, you're just setting a
>>>> flag. In order to make the drive bootable you have to move system
>>>> files to it (as well as setting the bootflag). In WindowsME there's no
>>>> (easy) way of making a bootable hard drive except by installing the
>>>> whole OS.
>>>
>>> Rick,
>>> Thanks for replying. When you say "flag",
>>
>> in FDISK, the "make partition active" flag. (I couldn't think of the word
>> "Active" at the time)
>>
>>> are you refering to the Master Boot Record (MBR)? I looked and found MBR
>>> defined as:
>>>
>>> "The first physical sector of the hard disk from which the content is
>>> loaded to the main memory and executed by the BIOS. This code then loads
>>> either the operating system from a hard disk partition or a more
>>> sophisticated boot loader, such as LILO"
>>>
>>> Is it possible for a second hard drive not to have an MBR?
>>
>> nope. well it's possible but then you can't use the disk.
>
> Well, what if you have two hard drives and only one of them has an OS on
> it... say you're using the second one simply for data file storage. Would
> it still need an MBR?
>
> --
> Regards from John Corliss

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsme.general (More info?)

Noel Paton wrote:

> yes

Thanks. However, if MBR is defined (at least on one site) as ""The first
physical sector of the hard disk from which the content is loaded to the
main memory and executed by the BIOS. This code then loads either the
operating system from a hard disk partition or a more sophisticated boot
loader, such as LILO", why would a data-only disk need one? Why wouldn't
the MBR on the master disk suffice?

--
Regards from John Corliss

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsme.general (More info?)

The MBR contains not only the bootstrap (where applicable) but the
definition of the partitioning of the disk... without that, no disk.


John Corliss wrote:
> Noel Paton wrote:
>
>> yes
>
>
> Thanks. However, if MBR is defined (at least on one site) as ""The first
> physical sector of the hard disk from which the content is loaded to the
> main memory and executed by the BIOS. This code then loads either the
> operating system from a hard disk partition or a more sophisticated boot
> loader, such as LILO", why would a data-only disk need one? Why wouldn't
> the MBR on the master disk suffice?
>

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsme.general (More info?)

(thanks, Rick!)


--
Noel Paton (MS-MVP 2002-2005, Windows)

Nil Carborundum Illegitemi
http://www.btinternet.com/~winnoel/millsrpch.htm

http://tinyurl.com/6oztj

Please read http://dts-l.org/goodpost.htm on how to post messages to NG's

"Rick T" <plinnane3REMOVE@NOSPAMyahoo.com> wrote in message
news:uVJfqQORFHA.2384@tk2msftngp13.phx.gbl...
> The MBR contains not only the bootstrap (where applicable) but the
> definition of the partitioning of the disk... without that, no disk.
>
>
> John Corliss wrote:
>> Noel Paton wrote:
>>
>>> yes
>>
>>
>> Thanks. However, if MBR is defined (at least on one site) as ""The first
>> physical sector of the hard disk from which the content is loaded to the
>> main memory and executed by the BIOS. This code then loads either the
>> operating system from a hard disk partition or a more sophisticated boot
>> loader, such as LILO", why would a data-only disk need one? Why wouldn't
>> the MBR on the master disk suffice?
>>

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsme.general (More info?)

Noel Paton wrote:
> (thanks, Rick!)
>
>
np, unlike the OP I think of MBR as EmmBeeArr instead of "Master *Boot*
Record"... took a bit.

Rick

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsme.general (More info?)

Book "Data Recovery with & without Programming" may be useful for this.

Please find the contents of the book on following link:

http://www.datadoctor.biz/author.htm

Regards,

Tarun Tyagi



John Corliss <jcorliss@fake.invalid> wrote in message news:<uNEKvUERFHA.1476@TK2MSFTNGP09.phx.gbl>...
> Mart,
> Thanks for the link. Good stuff there.
>
> Mart wrote:
> > John,
> >
> > The MBR command is potentially very powerful and can 'damage' your hard
> > drive if not used properly. Check out the following KB article first and
> > note the "Warnings"!!
> >
> > "FDISK /MBR Rewrites the Master Boot Record"
> > http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;69013
> >
> > Also, take a look at this site about fdisk commands (including MBR)
> > http://www.computerhope.com/fdiskhlp.htm#01
> >
> > John Corliss wrote:
> >> N. Miller wrote:
> >>> John Corliss wrote:
> >>>
> >>>> I notice that a person has the option of making a drive bootable or
> >>>> nonbootable using FDISK. Why would a person *not* want to make a drive
> >>>> bootable? If the drive doesn't have an OS on it and through some mistake
> >>>> is configured in the BIOS as the first bootable drive, wouldn't the worst
> >>>> that could happen be that you would get a "Non-system disk" error
> >>>> message?
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> Is it "bootable" disk, or Primary DOS? I can run fdisk on my current
> >>> system, but I only used the status option. I have two physical drives.
> >>> Drive 0, which appears to the OS as "C:\", has a PRI DOS partition, Drive
> >>> 1, which has three partitions, appearing to the OS as "D:\", "E:\", and
> >>> "F:\", has EXT DOS partitions. I only use a PRI DOS partition when I
> >>> expect to install a bootable OS. If I don't expect to boot from the
> >>> partition, I set it as an EXT DOS partition. That may only apply to MSFT
> >>> OSes; I've not, yet, attempted to create a partition for a non-MSFT OS.
> >>
> >> Norman, thanks very much for replying.
> >>
> >> This subject is very confusing to me, since the instructions I found at
> >> the Microsoft website for using FDISK and FORMAT contain so much undefined
> >> terminology. That's not their fault, since I'm sure a certain level of
> >> expertise has to be assumed. But in this case, the subject is a reasonably
> >> complex one. Thus my initial question, which may not have been the correct
> >> one.
> >>
> >> On my system, I used FDISK on each of my two hard drives when they were
> >> independently connected (the other was temporarily disconnected) as the
> >> master hard drive. The main hard drive has two partitions, the backup hard
> >> drive has only one. Both drives then have been FDISKed to have an MBR I
> >> guess?

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsme.general (More info?)

This almost counts as SPAM!!

no - after a longer look at the site - it IS SPAM!



--
Noel Paton (MS-MVP 2002-2005, Windows)

Nil Carborundum Illegitemi
http://www.btinternet.com/~winnoel/millsrpch.htm

http://tinyurl.com/6oztj

Please read http://dts-l.org/goodpost.htm on how to post messages to NG's

"Author Tarun Tyagi" <tyagi_st@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:a921f5f5.0504220951.4257bd50@posting.google.com...
> Book "Data Recovery with & without Programming" may be useful for this.
>