Format: Lost Disk

[SerialBumpy]

Hi, I have an external hard drive case connected to my computer [i have xp] through the usb. I put a hitachi deskstar 250GB drive in the case, and everything was working fine. I wanted to wipe the external drive of old stuff, so someone told me to go into the dos prompt in windows and type:

format E: [the letter of my external drive]

After reaching 100%, I got this message:

All NTFS boot sectors are unwriteable. Cannot continue. [there was more, but I didn't write it down]

The drive simply disappeared in Windows, and I can't find it under Disk Management when I go into "Manage" in on 'My Computer'. Any suggestions? I'm sure there's a quick fix for this. Windows still recognizes the USB device.

[glc]

Remove the drive from the case and install it inside the computer - paying attention to proper jumper settings. Then reinitialize it in Disk Management.

[SerialBumpy]

Originally Posted by glc Remove the drive from the case and install it inside the computer - paying attention to proper jumper settings. Then reinitialize it in Disk Management.

OK, I put it in the cpu as a slave; how do I initialize it?

[glc]

Open up Disk Management and see if it's there. If so, you can right click and do whatever you need with it - repartition, reformat, etc. Look in the lower right, the pane with the bar graphs.

[SerialBumpy]

Originally Posted by glc Open up Disk Management and see if it's there. If so, you can right click and do whatever you need with it - repartition, reformat, etc. Look in the lower right, the pane with the bar graphs.

Formatting... 1%

Thanks so much for the help; the drive seems to be formatting properly so far.

[SerialBumpy]

worked perfectly, thank you again!