mju@mudos.ann-arbor.mi.us (Marc Unangst) (04/23/89)
Rather recently, I decided to stop running MINIX on my hard disk and format that partition for DOS. Because I didn't want to have to back up and then restore the contents of my other partition, which would have taken well over 2 hours, I decided to leave the partition structure the way it was (17MB C:, 3.9MB D:), and just reformat the second partition for DOS. So, I twiddled the Partition Assignment Bit in IO.SYS (using Zenith's CONFIGUR utility) to Manual, and then ran ASGNPART to assign Partition 2 to drive D:. (I'm running Zenith MS-DOS v3.1.) Then, I used FORMAT.COM to format drive D:. So far, so good. I can now use drive D:, and everything else works fine. However, when I start up NDD, it pops up the "Analyzing Partition Table..." message, takes it down (as normal), and then crashes so hard that even the three-finger salute doesn't work. I have to cycle the power to regain control of my machine. The only drivers I have in my CONFIG.SYS are those for a ramdisk, and DoubleDOS's ANSI.SYS replacement (DBLDANSI.SYS). When I tried rebooting without a CONFIG.SYS or AUTOEXEC.BAT (i.e., without assigning partition 2 to drive D:), NDD didn't crash. It put a D> prompt at about line 1, column 50. For some reason, DOS then thought that there were NO files on ANY disks. When I typed DIR, I just got a "File not found" message. Whenever I tried any external command, it just said "Bad command or file name", without even accessing the disk. I have to reboot (soft) to get things back to normal. I'm getting desperate here. I usually run NDD's full surface check every week, to make sure the disk is okay, and I can't do that now. I haven't been able to check drive D: at all, and that concerns me: It has a bad cluster on it, and I'd like to lock it out before it starts to corrupt files. -- Marc Unangst UUCP : mju@mudos.ann-arbor.mi.us UUCP bang : ...!uunet!sharkey!mudos!mju UUCP bang alt.: ...!{ames, rutgers}!mailrus!clip!mudos!mju Internet : mju@mudos.ann-arbor.mi.us
cgh018@tijc02.UUCP (Calvin Hayden ) (04/25/89)
You write: > Rather recently, I decided to stop running MINIX on my hard disk and format > that partition for DOS. Because I didn't want to have to back up and > then restore the contents of my other partition, which would have taken . . . > I'm getting desperate here. I usually run NDD's full surface check > every week, to make sure the disk is okay, and I can't do that now. > I haven't been able to check drive D: at all, and that concerns me: > It has a bad cluster on it, and I'd like to lock it out before it starts > to corrupt files. ... Depending on the version of Norton you're running, there is a problem with the utilities. As I remember, 4.5 had problems when used with dos and *ix type file systems. I'm not sure what the problem was, but I seem to remember from a posted note that it dealt with the trashing of partitions. I think that a letter was to be sent to registered users informing them of problem, with info on what to do. This may or may not be related to what you've seen, but sounds like it might be if you're using 4.5. Cal
mpcook@chinet.chi.il.us (Michael P. Cook) (04/25/89)
You should be using Norton Utilities program files date stamped Jan 3 89. These were an update that you should have received a letter about. Call them. ________________________________________________________________________ Mike Cook Oak Park, IL usenet: mpcook@chinet.chi.il.us data: 312-383-6335 - Discovery Place BBS, 3/12/2400, 8N1 =>Home of Children's Software Library ________________________________________________________________________ THESE ARE MY OWN OPINIONS AND ARE NOT SHARED BY MY EMPLOYER OR ANYONE ASSOCIATED WITH MY EMPLOYER (I'M SURE, BECAUSE THEY COULDN'T CARE LESS ABOUT THESE ARCANE ISSUES). ________________________________________________________________________
mitch@arcturus.UUCP (Mitchell S. Gorman) (04/25/89)
One thing I have discovered about NDD is that it will lock up (Divide Error sound familiar??) when one runs it on a non-bootable partition (my AT clone only supports one Dos partition). When you start NDD up, it runs thru some initialization checks of the boot record, etc. At this point, it will display error messages saying that it has found non-standard "stuff" and do you want to fix it? Well, your answer should be 'NO'. It sorta makes sense: if it's not your booting partition, and it's just a place to work in after the system is already running, then why does it need a boot sector that is correct, eh? If you do not fix those initial errors, NDD will not lock up. At least that is how I have managed to avoid the problem with my clone (Award Bios, ST251-0, 2meg C:, 6meg D:, 12meg E:, 20meg F:). Of course, if NDD displays errors in the FAT or directory tree, let it fix'em. That's what it's s'posed to do! Mitch @ Rockwell, Anaheim Disclaimer: NDD ain't perfect, but it's still a good tool!