Hello!

My system has been slowing down in the past few months, and I haven't done a fresh install since getting it, so I figured the time was ripe and attempted to do so this weekend. I found some great info here, but eventually I hit stumbling blocks that nothing specifically addressed.

So, my primary drive is a RAID set up. My floppy with the drivers was apparently corrupt, but I'm certain I downloaded proper replacements. This isn't the problem, but might be useful info.

I haven't been able to figure out how to get the drive to work in a straight DOS bootup. I mainly want this so I can delete the old Windows directory before doing a new install, so I don't have to install to a new named directory - not a big deal though.

Anyway, I put in my XP CD, go through the boot up process, it loads my RAID drivers ok. The problem is when I get to the drive selection. My IDE hard drive (with multiple partitions) comes up first, FAT32, and below them are two RAID options. One is formatted, but with an "Unknown" file format and another is listed as unformatted (I presume this is the other half of the striped RAID 0 setup, and not to be trifled with, so I don't touch it). My RAID drive is NTFS, I can confirm this by booting into windows normally (and since it is where XP is currently installed, I am 100% it works). Regardless, setup isn't recognizing it.

Normally, when installing windows, you can select a drive and tell it not to format, just install. Well, since it's unable to figure out what to make of my RAID drive's format, it is going to force me to format if I confirm that selection. I do not want to do this.

Anyone know of a way I can get the Windows setup (which is a recovery disc with WinXP SR 1a) to properly recognize my RAID drive is formatted? My main stumbling block, I suspect, is that I'm not familiar with working with the SCSI RAID drive outside of the windows environment, and haven't been able to find anything online about this problem either.

Hi WildElf, and welcome to PCHF.

It is strongly not recommended to do a "fresh" install without formatting. Infact it is **** near impossible. During the installation process, Windows puts files everywhere, C:, C:\Program Files, C:\System Volume Information, etc etc etc. If you were just to delete the Windows dir, then whatever problems you had - would be transfered over to the new install.

Also...are you haven't any problems with windows at present? or just the urge to format? If you've got no problems...why fix something that's not broken?

In regards to your RAID drive...RAID0 is stripped, which means there should be no "other half". If you're getting "unknown file format" messages, then you've got the wrong RAID drivers. What motherboard do you have?


Oh. and you can't use DOS in NTFS....dos is too old and only works in FAT32, or FAT16...ntfs won't even show up in dos.

Thanks for the response. I hope I can clear up my motives and answer your questions:

I wouldn't say entirely problem free. My browsers (both Opera and Firefox) take tens of seconds to boot up, sometimes nearing a minute, and this seems to have steadily increased the past few months. And games that used to get smooth framerates are getting more and more bogged down. I can't find anything specific running on my system that would cause this (I haven't added any new anti virus or firewall software, and I'm spyware and malware free, I've done a throughout check through my task manager). The assumption I'm left with is that simply windows has gotten cluttered and dirty and needs a fresh start. I would go ahead and format, but I've got around 80 gigs of various save games and files that will be a pain to back up. I have no problem deleting Program Files, System Volume, or any other Windows associated directories to help get the freshest install possible, I just am trying to avoid reformatting.

I understand formatting is better, but it's the backup that's got me concerned. Other drives would take the install without reformatting, but I'd rather keep the same primary drive.

I've got an nForce mobo. The SATA drivers that came with my system are "Silicon Image SiI 3112 SATALink," though the floppy that came with my system had one critical file corrupted, so I downloaded replacements. The replacements I downloaded should be the same, perhaps newer versions, and windows text setup does recognize there's a drive there, it just doesn't identify it clearly enough.

Ah, right. I made a system boot disc in Windows, so I was hoping it would still work. Looks like I'll try a windows boot CD if I want to go that route, then. But the main reason to do that is so I can delete the windows directories on my drive before doing the install, and there's not much point in that until I can find a way to avoid a reformat, otherwise that's pretty much moot.

Have you thought of just doing a repair install? I've done it once before and it ran again for around 8 months before i decided to do it properly.

Trust me on the backup issue...i know how much of a pain in the backside it is...i personally have 790gb worth of hard drive space...with about 100gb free at the moment...backing up the rest when i need to format a hard drive...to clear it of bad sectors....well...it's a pain, and don't mistake it.

It ran again? Well, it's running now, but did it improve performance? I was suspecting that a repair install wouldn't help much since there's nothing really broken, just probably cluttered.

Well...unfortunatly there's not many other options. (That I'm aware of)

All I can really suggest is find a friend with a spare 80gb of hd space, and backup onto that. Once you've done a complete format, create 2 partitions. 1 for your operating system, the other for your games/downloads

That way you dont have the issue of backup anymore.


With your RAID drivers...it's a bit of a wierd one. You're right..they should work. Try loading them onto another disk as the one you're using may be faulty.

Yup, I've learned my lesson about keeping my OS and data separate (funny, I did this previously, and then never had cause to reformat). Thanks for the help!