PC Tech: Getting Rid Of Linux

Factual Questions
1
      • I have a Win98 PC that had Mandrake on a second HD. I decided to get rid of the Makdrake, and couldn’t figure out how to do it. I couldn’t find any mention of fdisk and the setup routine refused to allow deleting the Linux partition. Linux knowitalls kept acting like I was an idiot, but after looking around in Mandrake for a couple weeks, I never found anything that said how to remove the Mandrake installation on a dual-boot two-HD system. I reformatted and reinstalled Win98 today, hoping that the Win98 format would find the second HD, but it didn’t. It reformatted the first and blew away the MBR/LILO but left the second drive untouched. So now I have Win98 single-boot on the first HD and Linux stranded (as useless as ever) on the second.
  • Short of paying for a retail partition program, how can I reclaim the second HD? I am going to remove the second drive from the PC anyway to make room for a CD-R, but it really pisses me off; at this point I’d just kinda like the satisfaction of blowing it away. The Linux HD is only 6 gigs, but I want to put it in another older PC and put Win95 on it. Will I be able to just set it up as a master again and do a regular floppy boot/CD install? - MC
2

You’ll probably have to delete the Linux partition off the second drive before you can re-use it. To its credit, the Windoze installer is fairly paranoid about non-DOS partition types being on a hard disk. I don’t think it will over-write by itself the next time you install 'Doze.

Just start up 'Doze, get a DOS prompt window, and use the fdisk.exe program (might be in C:\windows, c:\dos or somewhere else. Do “dir /s fdisk.exe” from C:\ if you can’t find it.) Once you start up fdisk CHOOSE THE HARD DRIVE WITH THE LINUX ON IT and deleted the “non-DOS” parition.

Do NOT, and I repeat, DO NOT use fdisk to delete any partition on your first hard drive. I probably don’t have to tell you this, because you realize that you’d be deleting your Windoze partition, but just in case…
-Ben

3
      • FDISK does not find the second HD at all; it shows only one HD on the PC. I have a floppy, a main HD, a slave HD and a DVD-ROM. Before I installed Linux they listed as A,C,D,E. Now the drives only list as A (floppy), C(Win98) and D(DVD-ROM). The Linux drive is not listing at all, in any Windows system utility.-(?) - MC
4

I believe I used the Mandrake partition program to remove my Linux partition when I got rid of it. Just boot from CD with the installation program, get to the partition part, delete the Linux partition then create the DOS partition on the HD.

You got LiLo off the MBR, that’s the hardest part. :wink:

5

Low level format program which I’m sure you can get from cnet.com would kill anything and everything on your HD.

6

Actually, fdisk (in DOS) will do all of that stuff. Just get to a command prompt and type fdisk. (it’s in c:\windows\command)

Choose the disk that has linux on it (should be hard disk 2 in your case). In the fdisk interface, remove all the non dos partitions.

Create your dos partition(s).

Exit fdisk, so you’re back at the prompt. Now you have to get your former linux disk to be the primary drive, so the easiest way is probably to disable the primary one in bios after a reboot.

Use your dos boot diskette to get to a command prompt again, and type this:
fdisk /mbr

Reboot and reenable your primary drive, and you’re all done.

7

MC
FDISK does not find the second HD at all; it shows only one HD on the PC. I have a floppy, a main HD, a slave HD and a DVD-ROM. Before I installed Linux they listed as A,C,D,E. Now the drives only list as A (floppy), C(Win98) and a (DVD-ROM). The Linux drive is not listing at all, in any Windows system utility.

Then the master/slave jumper on the hard disks aren’t
set right, the second hard disk data or power cable isn’t
plugged in, the second hard drive isn’t recognized by the BIOS, etc, etc, etc…
-Ben