FDISK & Harddrives help

[BrainDanceR]

Hi Peeps.

Sorry, if this is a little noobish, but I would like some help before I trash my box

First, a little history about my aging rig:

My original system came with a 20GB HD (back in 2000!), with Windows 98.
About 2 years later, I bought a new 120 GB drive, partitioned it into 2 (60GB each).
I then installed Windows 2000 onto one of the partitions.
Then, about 2 years later, I installed windows XP on the other partition.

So Basically, my system is now:

MASTER Disk 1(20 GB) - C: (boot disk, windows 98) FAT 32
SLAVE Disk 2(120 GB - 1st 60GB Partition) D: (Windows 2000) NTFS
SLAVE Disk 2(120GB - 2nd 60GB Partition) E: (Windows XP). NTFS

I now want to get rid of that old C: drive, as its an IBM deathstar and starting to click.I feel Wont be long till it dies.

Now I only want to use the 2nd Disk, and reinstall Windows XP on the first partition, and keep my data on the second partition.

So how do I do this without losing my data from the second partition?

I am guessing I need to just set the 1st partiton to "Active" with FDISK, then format C: /s ...

Will this work,does it create all the boot.ini stuff I need? Also can I format NTFS in DOS?

Argh....probably being really thick...

 

[BrainDanceR]

anyone?anyone?

Bueller.....Bueller....Bueller....

 

[Farva]

so my understanding is you have a new drive and want to get the information off 2 old ones? if this is correct, then disconnect the old drives, install xp on the new drive, set the other 2 on another data chain as master with slave and slave, take data off. and if you are real picky, secure wipe the drives and then toss/sell them.

 

[texuspete00]

I believe to format an ntfs partition in Dos you will want to add a program called delpart onto your bootdisk. I use the 98SE bootdisk with delpart on it. Delete the partition with this, and then you can create a partition with unpartitioned space in fdisk, and format in dos. Then again I'm having problems getting my rig going on my SATA, but I remember this working fine for me in the past.