2 GB DOS partition on 30 GB hard drive

[cmhayes]

I was given an older PC with a Gigabyte GA-7ZX motherboard and 30 GB Maxtor HDD with Windows 98 loaded. The hard drive had a 2 GB FAT16 DOS 6.0.2 partition on it. The other 28 GB are MIA. I used the FAT32 conversion in Win 98 but ended up with a 2 GB FAT32 hard drive. Is there a way to recover the unused HDD space from Windows 98? Do I have to reformat the drive and reinstall the OS? Or will I need a third party partitioning program?

[Paleo Pete]

A third party partitioning program might do it, otherwise use fdisk or the drive manufacturer's installation software to re-partition using FAT32, then format and reinstall the OS. FAT 16 only sees partitions 2GB or less, that's why it's showing 2GB now. Fat32 can handle the entire 30GB drive as one partition or several smaller ones. I prefer several smaller partitions, 4-5GB each.

[computer mutt]

Okay others are sure to come along and wow me with their knowledge as always, but I thought I would give this one a shot.

I assume you are saying the extra 28GB has been missing even before you did the fat32 conversion and Win98 was in the 2GB fat16 partition.

It sounds like you need to create an extended DOS partition for the remaining 28GB. You should be able to do this with FDISK off of a windows 98 boot floppy.

WARNING You could accidentally delete your existing partition if you are not carefull

Boot with the Win 98 boot disk.
At the prompt A:\

Type FDISK

If prompted, and you should be type Y for large disk support.

Select 1. Create DOS partition or Logical DOS Drive

Select 2. Create Extended DOS Partition
Typically you can use the rest of the hard drive size which will be shown and press the Enter key

Press Esc to continue

You will be prompted to create logical drives in the Extended Partition. This is where you divide up the extended partition into multiple drives. For now I'll just assume one extra drive letter of D:

Use the full remaining size for the logical drive size

Press Esc to continue

Reboot with the floppy and Format the D: Partition

That should get you your missing 28GB usable by windows.

[Paleo Pete]

Computer Mutt

Nothing worng with your instructions, the procedure is right, but I think fdisk will force doing all partitions, not just one. That means format the existing C: partition and reinstall windows.

I may be mistaken, try it and see, the worst you can do is get an error message.

[cmhayes]

Thanks for the suggestions. I found the Maxtor installation disk, so I'll give that a try first.

[Paleo Pete]

That will set up partitions any way you like, but it is NOT non destructive, it will require reinstallation of the OS. So if you don't want to lose Windows, you'll need to use a third party application to get access to the rest of the drive.

[Paul Komski]

If you want to easily manage your partitions including non-destructive resizing Get BING (http://www.terabyteunlimited.com/)

Make the boot floppy from the download and boot to it. Dont bother to install it - just go into Maintenance and then choose Partition Work. All the options are there to resize, format, create, move(slide) partitions - and much more.

If you decide to install it on your hdd - suggest you don't let it make the 6 partition table entry option. Otherwise use it for the trial period before registration and purchase - it is cheap for what you get IMHO.