Can't see NTFS Drive in XP

[Richard]

Hi Mary

If it is not really essential that XP be on a FAT32
partition you should convert it to NTFS, that will solve
all your issues. Of course this is a one way deal but I
can't think of any really good reason not to convert it.


>-----Original Message-----
>Actually, that's not *exactly* true: XP sees the drive
in Disk Management,
>says it's active and on-line. But it has no drive letter
and the choice to
>give it one is greyed-out. Windows Explorer can't see it
at all.
>
>XP is on a FAT32 drive and the NTFS is a legacy from a
previous machine and
>I really need to extract the data from it.
>
>What do I need to do to get the files off?
>
>Mary
>.
>

[Alex Nichol]

Richard wrote:

>
>If it is not really essential that XP be on a FAT32
>partition you should convert it to NTFS, that will solve
>all your issues. Of course this is a one way deal but I
>can't think of any really good reason not to convert it.

It will not. XP is perfectly capable of handling any mix of FAT and
NTFS drives, no matter which it is installed on.

The most likely explanation for the problem is that the drive concerned
has got marked as 'Hidden' - maybe by some partitioning program like
Partition magic To check on that and fix it, I would use BootIT NG,
from http://www.BootitNG.com ($35 shareware - 30 day full functional
trial)

Download, to its own folder, extract from the zip, run the bootitng to
make a boot floppy.

Boot the floppy, Cancel Install, thus entering maintenance, then click
on Partition work.

Now select the drive concerned - from the description HD1 - on the left
and the middle pane will show the partitions on it. Highlight the one
concerned and click Properties. If there is a button 'UnHide' , which I
think there will be, click it, click OK, close and reboot, taking the
floppy out

--
Alex Nichol MS MVP (Windows Technologies)
Bournemouth, U.K. (remove the D8 bit)

[cquirke (MVP Win9x)]

On Wed, 28 Jan 2004 13:27:38 -0800, "Richard"

>If it is not really essential that XP be on a FAT32
>partition you should convert it to NTFS,

Why?

>that will solve all your issues.

How so? The issue she has is that she can't read an old NTFS volume,
and NT doesn't have to be hosted on NTFS to do that. One day, the
"old" NTFS you are urging her to convert to taday may get in the way
of accessing data from a newer NT version.

>Of course this is a one way deal but I can't think of any
>really good reason not to convert it.

Can't think of:
- HD failure and data recovery?
- forgotten passwords locking her out of content?
- active malware infection that needs to be cleaned up?

There are more things in the real world than are boasted about as
"solved" in MS's NTFS-boosting literature.

NTFS is NOT a best-fit for all users, especially consumers.



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