" format C:/s is a bad command or file name

[Alan Wilson]

Trying to set up new system. Just finished fdisk and rebooted. When I type in format C:/s and hit enter, message on screen is "bad command or file name" Is there a way to fix this, or should I erase all of the work already performed in fdisk and start over?

Celeron 600/128mb ram/15.3 gb hard drive
Boot disk was Windows 98
Attemped to set up 2 partitions on drive

[ixl]

That error just means the system can't find the "FORMAT.COM" file. It should be on the boot disk: check for it.
Are you at the A: prompt when you type the format command?

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Charles M. Kozierok
Webslave, The PC Guide (http://www.PCGuide.com)
Comprehensive PC Reference, Troubleshooting, Optimization and Buyer's Guides...
Note: Please reply to my forum postings here on the forums. Thanks.

[Paleo Pete]

Unless that was a typo, you have the command slightly wrong. Try putting a space before the forward slash. Example:

A:\>format_c:_/s would be the correct syntax and spacing. And as ixl noted, it has to be done from the A:\> prompt.

Note: I used underscores ( _ ) to point out the spaces. Use spaces instead.

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[Gary Lesser]

Clearly showing my ignorance, for what is the /s command used?

[ixl]

"/S" copies the system startup files to the hard disk, making the drive bootable.

------------------
Charles M. Kozierok
Webslave, The PC Guide (http://www.PCGuide.com)
Comprehensive PC Reference, Troubleshooting, Optimization and Buyer's Guides...
Note: Please reply to my forum postings here on the forums. Thanks.

[tallyman]

If you're using a Win 9* startup disk, this hasn't got the format command on it (I have never understood why). You either have to manually copy it over from the C:\windows\command folder, or let the startup disk set up the RAM directory and then run the command from there.

Hope this helps

John R

[Bmcdanold]

Actually if you make a new windows98 boot disk in windows98, it will have the format command on it. That burns me too why the boot disk that comes with win98 doesn't have format.

[meek]

hi, been doing the same command (format)of the responses i get is "trying to recover allocation units" then this long countdown starts - what does that mean? I have a 10G HD partitioned in 2G sizes. Help? http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif

[Bmcdanold]

Maybe you should start over and completely repartition and then reformat the hard drive. That sometimes works.

[meek]

Originally posted by Bmcdanold:
Maybe you should start over and completely repartition and then reformat the hard drive. That sometimes works.

Thanks, will try that and let you know what happened!

[Paleo Pete]

meek: Not good, trying to recover lost allocation units often means a bad or soon to be bad hard drive. Try booting to the Start Up disk and running scandisk from the command prompt. (Choose Command Prompt Only from the boot menu.)
scandisk /all /autofix /surface will run an unattended scandisk, add another switch /nosummary and it won't give the summary screen after it finishes. I would want to see the summary on this one if I were you. If you only have one hard drive, use scandisk c: /autofix /surface The /all switch tells scandisk to scan all attached hard drives, c: tells it to only scan C drive. Remember the spaces in the command line, they have to be there. If scandisk finds errors, run it again, if it finds more, run it still again, etc. About 5 times and if it's still finding more errors, the drive is well on its way.

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