FDISK And FORMAT a Hard Drive

This post gives instruction on how to :
1). FORMAT a 80GB Hard Drive,
2). Partition 80GB Hard Drive into FOUR equal parts,
3). Install the windows 98 Operating System to the drive.

NOTE:FDISK is a command that will Format your hard drive, before you start, make sure that your important data is backed up and you have enough space to install the windows.
Step 1). You need a Startup Disk:
1] Insert a blank formatted diskette into the floppy drive. Insert the Windows 98 CD into your CD ROM drive.
2] Double click on "My Computer" located on the desktop.
3] Double click on "Add Remove Programs".
4] Click on "Startup Disk" (Win98 Cd is required).
5] Click on "create".
Once you have that disk created, make certain that it reads your CD-ROM. If it does not, then you are going to be in serious trouble once you try to recover your operating system.
First check if it works or not?
Boot to a DOS (A:\>) prompt, insert a CD into your CD-ROM and type in DIR F: (or whatever your CD-ROM drive letter is, i will use "F" here, make certain there is a blank space between "DIR" and "F" press . If it reads the CD, first step is done continue on. If not, retry creating a Startup Disk or download one from following:
http://www.bootdisk.com/bootdisk.htm
http://www.freepctech.com/pc/002/files010.shtml
http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/
http://www.allbootdisks.com/

Once you have a functional Startup Disk, insert it into the floppy drive and Windows 98 CD into the CD-ROM drive.

Step 2). Reboot using your Startup Disk.
You will be asked to choose from 2 or 3 options. Select the option to boot without CD-ROM support.
At the DOS (A:\) prompt, type in: FDISK press .

Step 3). You will now see a message stating: Your computer has a disk larger than 512 MB, do you wish to enable large disk support (or something to this affect). Here "Large Disk Support" means "FAT32". Press "Y" to enable large disk support.
You should now see the main "FDISK Options" menu and the "Enter choice:" prompt. Here it will state "Current fixed disk drive:1". This indicates the first disk it has found on your system. If you only have one hard drive, this will be your choice else decide your choice you want to work on.

Step 4).If partition(s) exists, proceed to step "1a" below.
1. Select option "1" to create partition.
2. Select option "1" again to create primary DOS partition.
3. It will prompt you "Do you wish to use the maximum available size for a Primary DOS partition and make the partition active (Y/N)?"
Answer "N" press . As we are making four partitions, if you want a single partition on your hard drive, then you would press "Y". It will show you the total space on the drive, and prompt you "Enter size in MBytes or percent of drive space (%):" You want this first partition to take up one quarter of the drive space, so type in "25%" (make sure to include the percent sign) press . It should tell "Partition created; drive letters changed or Added".
4. It should now send you back to the main "FDISK Options" menu, if not, then just press the key until you're back there.
1a). Select "Delete Partition on logical Dos Drive." press (option 3) .
1b). Select "Delete Primary Dos Partition." (option 1) press .
1c). Press to delete the partition.
1d). If there is a volume label listed, type it in exactly as it appears press . If not, just press .
1e). Answer yes to the last question and press .
1f). Press key and proceed to step 1 above to create partition.

Step 5). Now let's fill up that extended partition you've just created by making three logical partitions of it.
1). Again, choose option 1 "Create DOS partition or logical DOS drive" and press .
2). This time, choose option 3 "Create Logical DOS drive(s) in the Extended DOS Partition" and press .
3). It will prompt you to "Enter logical drive size in MBytes or percentage of disk space" once again. Type in "33%" with the percent sign press .
4). It will create the first logical partition, and immediately prompt you to "Enter logical drive size...".
5). Again, type in "33%", with the percent sign, press .
6). It will create the second logical partition, and prompt you once again to "Enter logical drive size..."This time, look above the prompt, to where it says "Maximum space available for logical drives is (some number)***** MBytes". Type in the number of MBytes shown, without a percent sign, press .
7). It will create the third logical partition, and tell you that "All available space in the Extended DOS partition is assigned to logical drives" what this means is you have filled up the entire hard drive space.
8). Press the key to continue.
9). Press the key again to exit FDISK.

Step 6). You should now be back at the DOS (A:\>) prompt. Press Ctrl>Alt>Delete to restart your computer.
Let it boot again from your Startup Disk. Choose the option without CD-ROM support. When it returns to your DOS (A:\>) prompt, type in: FORMAT C: (make certain there is a blank space between FORMAT and C:) press . This will now format your drive "C".
When that finishes, format D drive, type in: FORMAT D:, then E:, and lastly FORMAT F: to complete the format for remaining partitions.
You should now have a hard drive with four newly created 20GB partitions. Now you can install Operating System of your choice.

Step 7). Reboot your system using the Startup Disk again. At the option screen, select the option "Boot using CD-ROM support". When you get to the DOS (A:\) prompt, type "D:"
The prompt should now say D:\, at this prompt type: SETUP press .

Step 8). Scandisk will run and take you right into Windows setup. Follow the onscreen instructions carefully.

NOTE: If Windows prompts you for drivers for certain hardware, just select cancel for now until Windows is fully installed, as you can install those after the windows installation.

Step 9). Install Drivers:
1). Double click on "My Computer".
2). Double click on "Control Panel".
3). Double click on "Systems"
4). Click on the "Device Manager" tab on top.
5). Go to the category called "Other Devices" and double click on it.
6). You will see devices with a "!" mark. Highlight those devices and remove them one by one.
7). After removing all those devices, Reboot your system.
You may see network card drive, commonly known as "Ethernet adapter".
The Sound card, commonly detected as "multimedia device".
The Fax modem, commonly detected as "communication device".
Install the appropriate drivers for each device.

Step 10). Enjoy the work with new installed windows.