Deleting and Creating the Primary Partition

Since this computer has been operational, it already has a partition. You are going to first delete the existing partition and then create a new partition.

  1. For the hard drive to function it needs to have a partition. The partition takes the space on the disk and makes it so it can be formatted.
  2. The partition your hard drive uses to create the bootable portion of the disk is called the primary partition.
  3. Since you are at the A:> prompt any DOS command you type in will need to come from the floppy in the "A" drive. In the previous assignment you created a bootable floppy with three additional files on it. FDISK was one of those files. It is a DOS utility used to create partitions on hard disks.
  4. Type FDISK at the A:> prompt and press Enter.
  5. The first thing you are asked is if you want to allow for large drives. Earlier in the history of computers hard drives where not very big (storage space). If you had a 1GB hard drive you had a lot of storage capacity. However as files and programs became more sophisticated larger drives became essential. DOS could not create partitions over 2 GB in size. Now there is no piratical limit on the size of your partition. So to accommodate for larger drives the FDISK utility was modified so larger partitions could be created. This question is asking you if you want to allow for partitions over 2 GB.
  6. Answer Yes and press Enter.
  7. The main FDISK options menu comes up. Notice you have four choices.
  8. Type 4 and press Enter. This will allow you to see the existing partition on the hard drive. In most cases you will have only one partition. See display screen. In the example there are two partitions.
  9. Press Esc to go back to the main menu.
  10. Since you already have a partition on the hard drive you are going to delete the existing partition first.

     

     

    It is important to note that FDISK can be very dangerous to use. Once you delete the partition all data on the hard drive will be gone forever.

  11. Type 3 and press Enter. This takes you to the FDISK Delete Menu.
  12. You have four choices. You probably found, when you displayed the partition information, that you had only one partition. This is your primary partition. Type 1 and press Enter to delete the primary partition.
  13. You will be asked for three pieces of input. First which partition. This is the partition number. It is probably 1. Type 1 and press Enter.
  14. You will be asked for the Volume Label. Look at the top of the screen to see what the volume label is. Many times it is blank. Type the volume label name and press Enter. (If the volume label is blank just press Enter).
  15. You are now asked if you are sure. This is the point of no return. If you really want to delete the partition and lose everything on the hard drive then type Y and press Enter.
  16. The primary partition is now deleted.
  17. Press Esc to return to the main menu.
  18. It is now time to create a new primary partition. Type 1 and press Enter.
  19. You are now at the Create Partition screen. You have three choices. Since you don't have a primary partition you need to create one. Type 1 and press Enter.
  20. It will create the partition. When it is done it will ask you if you want to make the partition active. This is asking you if you want this partition to be able to be bootable. You do. Type Y and press Enter. It will complete the process.
  21. You will get back to the main menu. Press Esc to exit.
  22. You will need to restart your computer. Make sure the bootable floppy is still in the drive.

Unit 4 — The Computer Repair Project