Re: Reformatting hard disk.

On Jan 28, 12:46 pm, Grant <g_r_a_n...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Mon, 28 Jan 2008 09:08:23 -0800 (PST), "j...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx" <j...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
After various experiments, including an attempt to install Windows
2000 (it failed) I can no longer boot from /dev/hda. I have
reassigned /dev/hdb as my hard drive boot device in the bios.

Now I want to do a low level format on /dev/hda and start all over. I
have already tried the trick of using a DOS fdisk from a floppy to
zero out the MBR:
A: fdisk /mbr
That may have made things worse, I don't know.

Doesn't help linux :)



There is a dd command that will zero out the mbr first block but I
forget what the exact string is.

dd if=/dev/zero bs=512 count=63 of=/dev/hda

Zeroes out the first cylinder, clears the partition table...

I prefer to zero the entire drive for reuse, this also gives the drive a
chance to remap any iffy sectors:

dd if=/dev/zero bs=1M of=/dev/hda

I am doing that as we speak (or write, actually.) It takes a long
time.

<snip>

When I try to use it in a normal manner as the boot device LILO gives
me an L followed by
series of 99 99 99 etc.

Forget to run lilo after rewriting /etc/lilo.conf?

No. But lilo might have gone to the wrong drive.

In any case the work proceeds. Thanks to all who wrote.

John C.
.