How do I delete the boot record?

I have a C: drive and a D: drive. The C: drive has Windows ME and the D: drive used to until I did the following.

I went to Tools/Folder Options/View and chose "show hidden files and folders". Then I deleted everything except the folders that I was keeping data in.

Now when I run Norton System Check it tells me that Drive D: has integrity problems, so I run Norton Disk Doctor. But when I do it tells me that there is an "invalid disk table in boot record". If I ask it to fix it I'm told "boot record could not be repaired".

I've posted about this problem a few weeks ago, but this time I don't want to fix the boot record, since I only want the drive for data. I want to know how to delete the boot record, so that I don't get that error message any more. Thank You.

EDIT: If I use my Win ME emergency boot disk to get into DOS and type fdisk /mbr, it won't delete any of my data folders will it?

 

Strange that you have a boot record on the D-drive guess it is a primary partition.

I wouldn't touch the boot-record before backing up all data on all partitions.

If you can't get any tools to fix it like fdisk /mbr then I would delete the partition using fdisk and recreate it. (Or just leave it alone if scandisk in windows says everything is ok, sometimes Norton fixes errors which arent there)

 

I used booted into DOS, using the floppy, and typed D:. Then I typed DIR to make sure that I was on the right drive. Then I typed FDISK /MBR and hit enter. I got the D: prompt, so I rebooted. I ran NDD on the D: drive, but I still got the same errors.
I guess I'll have to ignore that error from Norton System Check, each time I run it.

 

Is norton up to date? Maybe its a problem they have issued with an update....

 

FDISK /MBR only rewrites the master boot record of the FIRST disk if finds. Usually, that's IDE-0, Disk 0. So if you have a C: drive and a D: drive, it's probably just rewriting the MBR for C:.

"NOTE: The fdisk /mbr command only re-writes the MBR on the system drive (DISK-0) using BIOS calls. You cannot specify any other drive for the fdisk /mbr command to operate on other than DISK-0." -- Source

Run chkdsk/scandisk on D: and see if it finds problems. I'm with goldfish... what version of NDD are you using?

You could also try THIS.

 

Yes, I've been running Live Update.

Thanks for the update on MBR. I didn't know that. I'm using Norton Utilities 2002. If I run Norton System Check and am asked to fix the problem with Scandisk or Norton Disk Doctor, I have chosen Scandisk, a few times, and gotten a green check mark in Norton System Check, only to see that the next time I run it I see the same error.

 

Well, if you sometimes have a problem and sometimes don't, it is probably a sign that something on a hardware level is malfunctioning, albiet not fatally.

You could try the HDD manufacturer's diagnostic tools to see if the drive itself is functioning correctly.

 

Thanks for reminding me. I'll give that a try.

 

How did you get this mess?

If you try to run Fdisk from a D:\> prompt you will get "bad command or file name" because Fdisk.exe is not on D drive (it was but you deleted it)! Fdisk is on the boot floppy and must be run from an A:\> prompt. There is a copy of Fdisk.exe on C: drive but to run it from there you would need to navigate to the proper directory and folder to run it.
C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND
or
C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND\EBD

Try
A:\>fdisk /mbr
or
A:\>sys C:
but I don't think either will help with your problem

If your HDD1 was once your HDD0 with a primary partition set active and you just moved it to HDD1 you need to remove the primary active partition because you can not have two primary active partitions (without using third party software) in a system.

If that is the case Fdisk will not work on that drive and will cause an error if you try.

You have 2 options:
1: Move all data from D: to C: and backup C: and use HDD manufacturers utilities to write zeros to D: then run Fdisk to create an extended DOS partition and a logical DOS drive reboot and format it.

2: Move all data from D: to C: and backup C: remove HDD0 from the system, install HDD1 as HDD0 run Fdisk to remove the primary partition from it. Reinstall the drives as they are now run Fdisk to create an extended partition and a logical DOS drive reboot and format it.

 

Thank you for your message, but I haven't been able to read it until today. I've been working on the PC, since I last posted. I have a 30GB and two 120GB drives. The 30GB had Windows ME and all of my other programs on it. One of the 120GB drives was a backup from a while back (I will call it the E: drive). I had made a lot of changes to the current 120GB drive (I will call it D: drive), so I decided to FDISK and Format the E: drive and copy all of the data from the D: drive to the E: drive. After I copied the data to the E: drive, I defragmented it. I then ran FDISK and Format on the two remaining hard drives. I reinstalled Windows ME and got all of the current drivers and Windows updates installed.

Then I had trouble trying to get the PC to recognize all three drives and the CD-RW, simultaneously. I had to move the jumpers and IDE cables around, until I got a good match. I ended up putting both 120GB drives on the secondary IDE cable and making one of the jumpers say that that drive was a master and the jumper on the other drive say that that drive was a slave. I kept the 30GB on the primary IDE cable and made the jumpers say that it was also a master. I removed the CD-RW, because I had to use it's cable for one of the 120GB drives.

Finally, I got Windows ME to recognize all three drives, but only if it was in safe mode. This was okay, since I just wanted to copy the data back to the D: drive. I am still doing that at the present time. After it finishes I'm going to defragment it and store the drive outside of the computer.

I was also having problems trying to install Norton Internet Securities (NIS) onto the 30GB drive, before I decided to quit and start copying data on the other drives. I hope that when the data finishes copying that I can figure that out. I'll spare you the specifics, until I give it another shot. I'll re-format that 30GB drive again, if I have to. I actually had to install Windows 4 times, before it loaded without showing any errors. I had to try a backup copy that I had made of the Windows disk, because I think that the other one is corrupt or scratched.

My 120GB drives have 98GB of data on them, so all of this is taking a few days.

I've also been trying to install a NIC on the other PC, which is running Windows 98. Windows recognized the NIC and the device manager said that it was working properly, but I couldn't get the PC to get to the Internet by dial-up or cable modem. I asked for tech support from the cable modem people, the Best Buy store where I bought the NIC, Best Buy's national help center, and the makers of the NIC. The only one's that I didn't ask were the makers of the router, because I was bypassing the router to track down the problem. Nobody had a good answer for me and my other PC was busy copying and didn't have NIS installed, so I had to figure this out myself. I was mostly told, by the techs, that they didn't know what was wrong. I was told to see if my cable provider registered MAC addresses, but I found out that they don't.

I didn't know what to do. I knew that the cable modem worked on my Windows ME PC, so I thought about installing Windows ME onto the Win98 PC. This would have taken way too much time and effort. I would have had to backup all of the data from the Win98 PC, to one of my drives after they finished what they were doing, format the Win98 drive and install Windows ME, then transfer all of the data back and re-install all of the programs.

I did not want to do that, because I knew there had to be an answer to the problem. I thought about taking the NIC back, but I wanted to know why the 56K modem would no longer connect to the Internet. I realized that it would dial the Internet, like normal, but IE would say that it couldn't display the web page. After trying a few things, I took the CAT 5 cable out of the back of the PC and tried to use the modem, again. This time it worked perfectly. I was very hopeful that the reverse must be true, also. I went to the Control Panel/Network and removed the modem. I went to My Computer/Properties/Device Manager and made sure that it was removed from there, also. Then I physically removed it and put the NIC in it's spot (I moved the NIC, just to be sure). I restarted the PC and went to Internet Options/Setup and chose the options to install a LAN connection. I hit Internet Explorer and it worked perfectly.

I was very happy, but then when I tried to connect the PC to the router and the router to the cable modem I couldn't get onto the Internet. I called the tech support for the router. I was told to go to Start/Run and type command, and then type ipconfig. Then I was told to ping the gateway address. I kept getting request timed out. They told me to replace the CAT 5 cable, but I tried to explain that I was just on the Internet. I replaced the CAT 5 with the shorter piece that I was using to connect the cable modem to the router. I still got request timed out. I was told to hit reset on the router, but that didn't help, so I was told that the router was defective and that I should have it replaced. Then, after hanging up the phone, I restarted the PC and I tried to ping the gateway again. This time it was a different address, so I was hopeful. It worked, so I shut down the PC, replaced the CAT 5 cable and re-connected the cable modem. I turned on the PC and got onto the Internet with no problems.

Now, I'm just waiting for my PC to finish copying the data to the D: drive, so that I can defragment it and move it back to the primary IDE cable, connect the CD-RW, remove the E: drive, re-install NIS and the rest of my programs and connect the PC to the router. I can’t wait until I’m finished.