I started a previous thread to help me understand how to move an existing drive with 
legacy applications to a new system  (re: re-installing OS over existing OS on a new system

I have a related question but it warrants a new thread.

I will be setting up a dual-boot system with WinMe and XP on same drive. According 
to Microsoft, WinMe must be installed first, then XP.  

I'm not sure how to create and format the new partition for XP while running WinMe. 
If I use WinMe FDISK, I assume it will format the new partition as FAT32 since WinMe 
doesn't support NTFS. According to MS, XP also supports FAT32, but wouldn't I be 
losing all the benefits of NTFS?

Are 3rd-party disk utilities available (preferably freeware) that will run under 
WinMe, and capable of creating an NTFS partition?

Thanks,
David

Tip: Run a free scan for common Windows errors ad

3rd party not needed, but I have one for you anyway! Thursday, August 16, 2007 at 8:32 pm Posted by DNA (552 messages posted) 3rd-party utilities are not necessary. Create the C: partition of your desired size with the Win ME bootdisk, leave the rest of the hard drive space unformatted/unallocated, and install Windows ME. After Windows ME is installed, run Windows XP Setup and install Windows XP in the unallocated space. Windows XP Setup will offer to format the unallocated space as FAT32 or NTFS, if the space is under 32 binary GB. If the unallocated space is more than 32 binary GB, Windows XP Setup will format the unallocated space only as an NTFS partition. Windows XP will not create FAT32 partitions larger than 32 binary GB, so if you want there to be any other FAT32 partitions larger than 32 binary GB, you'll have to format them beforehand with the WinME bootdisk, or use the free open source GParted (Gnome Partition Editor), performing your partition setups booting the system from the GParted Live CD. XP can, however, be installed onto a pre-created FAT32 partition exceeding 32 binary GB, or XP Setup can convert any existing FAT32 partition to NTFS before it installs XP on it (and that's the best time to do a FAT32-to-NTFS conversion!). GParted, in my experience, occasionally creates partition cluster sizes smaller than normal for FAT32/NTFS partitions. When I put a new 120 GB HD in my laptop, it formatted the 13 GB NTFS "E" (XP O.S.) partition with a 512 byte cluster size ('default' is 4 KB) and the 90 GB FAT32 "D" data partition with a 16 KB cluster size ('default' is 32 KB). It did format the 8 GB FAT32 "C" partition (Win98 Boot) with the 'default' 4 KB cluster size. Since I didn't want the smaller cluster sizes, I had to reformat "D" from 98 (with the updated FDISK installed, of course!), then let XP Setup reformat the third partition (as NTFS) to get the default 4 KB cluster size I wanted. ---------------------------------------------------------- Athlon 1.1 - 768 MB RAM = 98SE & XP Home Athlon 3000+ 64 - 1024 MB RAM = 98SE (@768 MB RAM) & XP Pro IBM ThinkPad PIII 900 - 384 MB RAM = 98SE & XP Pro SP2 Windows 2000 Server in the basement [Reply or follow-up to this message] re: 3rd party not needed, but I have one for you anyway! Thursday, August 16, 2007 at 10:03 pm Posted by david (41 messages posted) DNA, this is exactly what I needed to know. From your sig, looks like you've done this a few times! I didn't realize XP setup would/could create and format its own partition. BTW, why would anyone want to install XP on a FAT32 partition? One more question... Since XP will live on virtual drive D (or whatever), will this create problems for software expecting the root directory to be C:/ ? David [Reply or follow-up to this message] XP on other than C: Friday, August 17, 2007 at 6:23 am Posted by DNA (552 messages posted) "..why would anyone want to install XP on a FAT32 partition?" Even though I put my personal XP installs on NTFS partitions, there would be one VERY good reason that some would want to put NT5 (2000/XP) on a FAT32 partition. All files on that partition would be accessible from Win9x. If the NT partition got any malware files that can't be removed while NT is running, you could boot up in 9x and remove any files you wanted to from the NT FAT32 partition! Yes, if you didn't know what you were doing, you could kill the NT install, but if you did know what files to remove (via HijackThis, Malware forums, Google, etc.), this would be a blessing! I built a dual-boot Win98/Win2000 computer for an auto repair shop (it can run just about any DOS or Windows auto diagnostic program!), and they asked me to install Win2K on a FAT32 partition. This computer is in their main office, so user access is physically restriced. "Since XP will live on virtual drive D (or whatever), will this create problems for software expecting the root directory to be C: ?" Since I personally have only run XP on drive letters other than C: (since XP came out in late 2001!), I can say that I have not found this to be much of a problem at all. Virtually all Windows program installers follow the registry's default Program Files location, which will be (drive letter the OS is on):\Program Files. Minor niggles: When you uninstall Lavasoft Ad-Aware from any location other than "C:", if you also have it installed on the O.S. on "C:", it will 'find' a 'previous version' install on C: and offer to uninstall it, after it's uninstalled the version on (drive letter where it was). nVidia also puts its NT video driver backup files by default on "C:\NVIDIA\Win2KXP\(version number)", even though the main program installer will always install on the correct O.S. drive letter by default. You can change the location for the video driver backup files when it comes up on the dialog box. Any DOS programs, you would likely want to run them from C: anyway (in a DOS window, or real-mode, as applicable) Even if you had some older (Win 3.1 vintage?) program whose installer didn't check the registry and the install location default is C:, you should be able to change the location manually during the install. So, yes, it never hurts to check the dialog boxes to see where a program is going to be installed at, but even if you have only one O.S. on C:, it's still a good idea to look! ------------------------------------------------------------- Athlon 1.1 - 768 MB RAM = 98SE & XP Home Athlon 3000+ 64 - 1024 MB RAM = 98SE (@768 MB RAM) & XP Pro IBM ThinkPad PIII 900 - 384 MB RAM = 98SE & XP Pro SP2 Windows 2000 Server in the basement [Reply or follow-up to this message] re: 3rd party not needed, but I have one for you anyway! Friday, August 17, 2007 at 6:45 am Posted by C K (6157 messages posted) If for any reason you want the drive where Win XP is installed to be seen by Win 9X, it must be in FAT. There are those of us who have been around long enough to know that NTFS can be a pain for some operations, like trying to recover data from a crashed drive, or we just don't need the overhead and security options (along with the associated problems of permissions), of an NTFS system. I use NTFS where file sizes need to be larger than 4 gig (audio/video files) and on server installations but not much else currently. Can programs that look for the C drive be effected? Yes they can, but more often they will look at the drive where the current running Windows install is. Some poorly coded program/installers may want to install onto your Win 9X (C)drive which wouldn't be very good, if it insists on storing user data, (and other files such as config files) there that you might want to retrieve in the event of a crash.. As for posting here, your questions were closely enough related to the same issue/operation that you could use the same thread, and the "forum police" around here would probably appreciate it. ;-) On Thursday, August 16, 2007 at 10:03 pm, david wrote: >DNA, this is exactly what I needed to know. From your sig, looks like you've done >this a few times! > >I didn't realize XP setup would/could create and format its own partition. BTW, why >would anyone want to install XP on a FAT32 partition? > >One more question... >Since XP will live on virtual drive D (or whatever), will this create problems for >software expecting the root directory to be C:/ ? > >David [Reply or follow-up to this message] more overhead? No thanks Friday, August 17, 2007 at 12:13 pm Posted by david (41 messages posted) On Friday, August 17, 2007 at 6:45 am, C K wrote: >...those of us who have been around long enough to know that NTFS can be a pain for some operations, like trying to recover data from a crashed drive, or we just don't need the overhead and security options (along with the associated problems of permissions), of an NTFS system. Hmm... your use of the term "overhead" gave me cause to pause. I guess I should have posed the opposite question. NTFS was supposed to offer improved recovery from disk crashes. I guess this feature is sorta like the RESTORE function in WinMe -- which never worked very well. Since my computer will not be on a network, it sounds like I should use FAT32. Thanks for the heads-up on this. David [Reply or follow-up to this message] re: more overhead? No thanks Friday, August 17, 2007 at 3:51 pm Posted by C K (6157 messages posted) NTFS is a journeled file system that keeps track of changes in a rather complicated way. This is supposed to make it more crash (corruption) resistant on bad shutdowns and power losses. It does in some instances and doesn't in others. (MS was working on improving the file system for Vista but wasn't able to get it done due to many issues) It won't make the HDD easier to recover and in fact makes it harder. Case in point, right now I am working on repairing my neighbors drive with file structure and Metadata corruption and errors. It would start after a while but you couldn't do anything nor could I image the drive for back up. (FAT doesn't have Metadata). I suspect his kids held the power button in and shut down the computer the wrong way. NTFS usually won't have to go through as many disk checks on bad shutdowns as FAT, but when NTFS gets corrupted, it's harder to work with than FAT32. Just my experience since NT and NTFS was released years ago.. ;-) [Reply or follow-up to this message] File systems Saturday, August 18, 2007 at 6:32 pm Posted by DNA (552 messages posted) "...when NTFS gets corrupted, it's harder to work with than FAT32." All of my data is on FAT32 partitions, that are separate from the O.S. partitions. The above quote explains why I do that. Occasionally I'll create a DVD ISO that will have to be on one of my NTFS O.S. partitions temporarily, due to FAT32's file size limitations. Since I have only an (NT) O.S. and its programs on my NTFS partitions, I can wipe the partition and restore it from my backup, in case the NTFS file system ever got trashed (and that would be from my backup DVD, made from the ISO, like I mentioned above!). ----------------------------------------------------------- Athlon 1.1 - 768 MB RAM = 98SE & XP Home Athlon 3000+ 64 - 1024 MB RAM = 98SE (@768 MB RAM) & XP Pro IBM ThinkPad PIII 900 - 384 MB RAM = 98SE & XP Pro SP2 Windows 2000 Server in the basement [Reply or follow-up to this message] re: 3rd party not needed, but I have one for you anyway! Sunday, August 19, 2007 at 11:57 pm Posted by david (41 messages posted) Hey DNA, I noticed in your sig you have dual-boot with 98SE with XP Pro running on an Athlon 3000+ 64. If the chipset supports 98SE, I imagine it would support ME. Thus far, I've limited my search to Socket A and Socket 478 (barton and northwood). Which core and chipset do you have? I'd like to check it out. [Reply or follow-up to this message] Asus A8V (Socket 939) Wednesday, August 22, 2007 at 6:27 pm Posted by DNA (552 messages posted) Sorry I didn't see your post sooner! My AMD 3000+ system is based on an ASUS A8V Socket 939 mainboard (the 'plain A8V' 8x AGP & 5 PCI slot version) using the VIA K8T800Pro chipset, and the 3000+ processor is a Winchester core, 1.8 Ghz clock speed. These mainboards were manufactured in 2005. You can download the spec sheet on this mainboard here. (scroll down to Socket 939, and click the "A8V" with no suffix, the last entry), and you can see the driver download page here. This is probably the best-ever mainboard with full Win9x (98SE/ME) support! If you want to use a SATA hard drive as the boot drive, (for either O.S.!) I advise using a SATA PCI controller card instead of this mainboard's built-in VIA VT8237 SATA chipset. There are a fair amount of 'budget' mainboards now using this same chipset... XP had random bluescreen memory dumps with the boot SATA drive connected to the mainboard VT8237, but it's never happened since I changed the drive to the controller card! Also, any Win9x that's freshly installed directly to a SATA drive that's connected to the mainboard will not load Windows' CD-ROM drivers correctly (so, you'll have no access to the CD drives!), and all the hard drives will be in MS-DOS access mode! OUCH! You can, however, install Win9x to an IDE drive first, install the VT8237 SATA driver in 9x, then clone the drive's contents to a SATA drive, and that's how I worked around that issue... However, installing Win9x to a SATA drive on a PCI controller card is 'cake', because then Windows Setup will think it's installing onto a hard drive on a 'SCSI controller', and everything will load correctly, and you can install the SATA 'SCSI controller' driver after Win9x is up and running (you'll see a yellow "?" in SCSI Controllers in Device Manager). Every SATA PCI card I've seen has Win9x support, but they all work at "SATA-1"/"SATA-150" speed, so some cards will require you to use a jumper setting on SATA-II/"SATA-300" drives to turn them down to SATA-1 speed. ---------------------------------------------------------- Athlon 1.1 - 768 MB RAM = 98SE & XP Home Athlon 3000+ 64 - 1024 MB RAM = 98SE (@768 MB RAM) & XP Pro IBM ThinkPad PIII 900 - 384 MB RAM = 98SE & XP Pro SP2 Windows 2000 Server in the basement [Reply or follow-up to this message] re: Asus A8V (Socket 939) Tuesday, August 28, 2007 at 9:27 am Posted by david (41 messages posted) DNA, This post was very helpful. Thank you for clarifying. I tried to contact you off-list last week using this board's link to your email address. Apparently you didn't receive? Please contact me at ginahoy at aol dot com. Thanks, David On Wednesday, August 22, 2007 at 6:27 pm, DNA wrote: Sorry I didn't see your post sooner! My AMD 3000+ system is based on an ASUS A8V Socket 939 mainboard (the 'plain A8V' 8x AGP & 5 PCI slot version) using the VIA K8T800Pro chipset, and the 3000+ processor is a Winchester core, 1.8 Ghz clock speed. These mainboards were manufactured in 2005. This is probably the best-ever mainboard with full Win9x (98SE/ME) support! If you want to use a SATA hard drive as the boot drive, (for either O.S.!) I advise using a SATA PCI controller card instead of this mainboard's built-in VIA VT8237 SATA chipset. There are a fair amount of 'budget' mainboards now using this same chipset... XP had random bluescreen memory dumps with the boot SATA drive connected to the mainboard VT8237, but it's never happened since I changed the drive to the controller card! Also, any Win9x that's freshly installed directly to a SATA drive that's connected to the mainboard will not load Windows' CD-ROM drivers correctly (so, you'll have no access to the CD drives!), and all the hard drives will be in MS-DOS access mode! OUCH! You can, however, install Win9x to an IDE drive first, install the VT8237 SATA driver in 9x, then clone the drive's contents to a SATA drive, and that's how I worked around that issue... However, installing Win9x to a SATA drive on a PCI controller card is 'cake', because then Windows Setup will think it's installing onto a hard drive on a 'SCSI controller', and everything will load correctly, and you can install the SATA 'SCSI controller' driver after Win9x is up and running (you'll see a yellow "?" in SCSI Controllers in Device Manager). Every SATA PCI card I've seen has Win9x support, but they all work at "SATA-1"/"SATA-150" speed, so some cards will require you to use a jumper setting on SATA-II/"SATA-300" drives to turn them down to SATA-1 speed. [Reply or follow-up to this message] Tip: Use one of the [Reply or follow-up to this message] links above to add a message to this thread Search this forum Start a new thread on a different subject Report abuse of the forum Return to the Windows Me Discussion Forum