formatting hard drive...

[eckoviscon]

Good day. Just wanted to ask :

I have tried two different methods to format my secondary master hard drive.

1. via windows formatting
2. via dos format command thru floppy boot disk
( have also performed thorough scan disk )

Both have been successful but whenever i tried to view the contents of said drive thru windows explorer after formatting, the contents are still there.

Also, before whenever I try to save a file to that hard disc it saves fine, but when I shutdown or reboot the file I jst saved is gone.

Now I tried to delete manually all the files and after confirming said deletion thru recycle bin its okay. But after a while it reappears again ( all the deleted files ) in the same hard drive.


Any help will be appreciated.

Tnx and God bless

[Gazorgan]

Wow. 10 years as a computer jockey and I've not seen that one.

Are you running any 3rd party products? Norton system works maybe? Any smart recovery tools?

OS and Filesystem?

[jdizzy40]

It would help if I knew what operating system you were running.

[noki]

sounds like XP pro

[impmon2]

Or for that matter if you're formatting the right drive. I've never heard of this either.

If all else fails, try Computer Management. (Windows XP, type "compmgmt.msc" in the Run box, not sure of other Windows) Select (and expand if needed) Storeage and then Disk Management. Select the offending hard drive and under Action menu, expand "All Task" and select "Delete Parition". Now try and format it and put a new partition in. If the old files still shows up, you have gremlins from hell.

[noki]

best way to format regardless of OS would be to use the utility that came with your HDD (MaxBlaster, etc.) to reformat the partition(s) your BIOS sees. it is on a floppy or a CD. if your secondary drive or its partitions are not reformat-able (ie unknown format) when you run this utility you probably have something like GoBack or similar restorative utility on it. good luck. that being the case reply to this and i will walk you thru the painfull process of restoring your drive so it can be formatted

[Wetmonkey]

another tool to whipe it completly clean
http://www.tolvanen.com/eraser/

[noki]

Wetmonkey
complete erasure is not the same as formatting.

[andkiich]

It could be possible that you are only formatting a smal partition on the second drive. when doing the format what is the size of the disk it is reporting? If it is not close to the size of the drive, then you are probably only getting a small partition and not the whole thing.

You might want to FDISK the secondary drive.

[SaSi]

Have you checked that you don't have a virus in your system?

[gmatov]

Is it possible this machine is restoring to a prior good configuration, Norton protected files, or some other AV program?

Or that XP just automatically assumes a catastrophy after massive deletes, does an "Undo"?

Hell, my 98 machine tells me Norton Protected Recycle Bin has 3000 files in it, and only deletes 15 or 25 at a time.

[Wetmonkey]

wow formatting does not erase the data, it removes just the reg entry in the fst. Either your having problems with your OS or something is not allowing you to delete info like everyone has stated above. that proggie i noted will remove the data and its free. I would attempt to actually remove data from the problem drive and then see if explorer is still showing the info then go from there. you may also has some corrupt sectors on your disk causing the disc to report information incorrectly, use a disk utility to check for damage to the disk and file system. also what file system your formatting the disk to with your tools might shed some light on the subject.

[fabiohcruz]

YOU MIGHT WANNA USE PARTITON MAGIC TO SEE WHAT IS "INSIDE" THIS DRIVE. DELETE ALL PARTITIONS, CREATE A NEW ONE AND THEN FORMAT USING THIS SAME SOFTWARE.

[eckoviscon]

Good day gentlemen. I certainly did appreciate all the info.

tnx a lot.

My operating system is win98se.

[gmatov]

In that case, asssuming a single large partition, boot with a bootdisk, fdisk>delete partition>create partition>set as Active(single partition will probably automatically be set as active, unless it is a second drive, in which it will tell you only the C: drive can be set as active partition)

Reboot. Format the drive under DOS.

If you have any data on the drive, you will, of course, have to cut and paste to a storage area.

Cheers,

George

[impmon2]

Windows 98 doesn't have anything that could be causing so much trouble so it had to be either a virus, spyware, or 3rd party program.

Try booting in safe mode and then reformat it. You could also try using Mutilate File Wiper (shareware, free to try) as it shreds any file that otherwise refused to go away. I've had great luck with it when I had Win ME and I had number of files that were "stuck" in rewcycle bin and couln't be deleted or moved out. You can get the latest version at http://home.att.net/~craigchr/mutilate.html