CD-ROM as C:drive?!?

[Wilbur]

I'm trying to fix a Tiny PC I recently got off a friend. The hard drive was formatted (and he may have used fdisk as well, but I'm not sure) before he gave it to me. I've tried the installing Windows (both 95 and ME) but I get the error message 'compressed or disk-cache utility on hard drive' and 'HPFS or NTFS installed' and windows will not install. I don't know of any of these things or what they do. I've tried the manufacturers recovery disks, but that didn't work. A strange thing that may be related it that when I use a floppy boot disk, I get info to say that the hard-drive is connected correctly (lists the drive on start-up) but I can't access it from DOS prompt! C: takes me to the CD-ROM.

Anyone know anything about this????

[Adam Pintar]

Your hard drive has been partitioned for nt if it is NTFS. you will have to use fdisk and delete any partitions on the drive then create a new partition that is active.

depending on the size will set if it is set up with large disk support or not. anything over a 2gig hard drive should be set with large disk support.

after you have made your partition make it active restart your computer then format the new partition. you use win98 disk for this.

I hope this help and i am no expert but that is what I would do. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif

[tjaymadison]

Welcome, Wilbur and Adam. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/biggrin.gif

If the CD drive is responding as C:, that's the first problem to tackle. At the DOS prompt, type in "dir d:" -- no quotes. If the response is a directory listing of the hard drive, you have cabling and/or jumper problems. If the response is "invalid drive specification", DOS is not recognizing the drive. If the response is something else, post it in your reply and we'll try to figure it out.

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"When I nod my head, hit it with the hammer."
(Moe, holding nail, to Curly, holding hammer)

[Wilbur]

Thanks adam and TJ. TJ - I got the invalid drive message when I typed dir d:. Adam - I deleted the partition, created a new active DOS partition and I was then able to format the hard drive http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif . I tried installing Windows but I still get the error saying about a compression or disk cache utility on my hard drive and it wont install.

Wilbur

[Adam Pintar]

I am no expert but it sounds like the drive was compressed within the operating system before. If this was so you are unable to uncompress from windows but need an other software utility to uncompress the drive.

also if the system did not detect the full size of the drive which can happen then it is not fully partitioned which could cause this problem.

In your cmos you can auto detect drives. Do this the go through the fdisk order then reboot format and see if this clears up the problem.


If this does not work then there may be something actually wrong with the drive.

Adam