Uninstalling Win98 on WinXP

[Nischint]

Hi all, this is my first post to this forum.

When I first got my computer, I had the old 20 GB hard disk partitioned into 5 partitions, so that each would hold about 4 GB. Then my new 40 GB hard disk was partitioned into 2, so I had 20 GB on each partition. On one of the partitions, my main C Drive, I installed Windows XP Pro, which I am extremely pleased with. Even installed SP 1, without a hiccup. On the other 20 GB partition, I installed Windows 98 SE, on my D Drive, just in case I needed it.

Now, after almost one year, I figured out that the Windows 98 is useless to me, so I want to uninstall it, without affecting my data in either partition, or hard disk, in any way. But I don't know how to do this. Worse, I can't find any good information on how to go about it.

Any help?

Once it's uninstalled, I also plan on destroying the partitions on my original 20 GB hard disk, and recombining the 5 partitions, into one solid hard disk again. Know how I can do this too?

[egghead]

Welcome to Techzonez Nischint,

If you have win98 on a second partition and you have removed all valuable data from that partition you can just boot into winxp and format the win98 partition or simply delete all the files.
when you boot your computer you should see a screen asking you to choose which operating system you wish to boot to.

if you go to control panel and system devices you will need to look for the startup folder. this will allow you to remove the win98 boot from your boot menu and you will automatically stat wwinxp on next boot

I am not at a winxp machine right now so I cant walk you thru it but im sure someone here will be happy to help.

enjoy you stay!!

egghead

[Big Booger]

Egghead told you the best solution to get this done.

Click start, my computer, right click on the windows 98 partition, click format, select which file system you'd like to use, NTFS seems to work well with XP, and click start.

Just make sure, like egghead said to copy any valuable data to your other partitions, before deleting the 98 partition.

About the boot, click start, right click my computer,
click on properties, click on the advanced tab at the top, click on the startup and recovery options,
then click "to edit the startup options manually" the edit button,
Then delete the entire line that references windows 98, but leave the XP line intact. Make sure the XP line is set to default.

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect

multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows 98" /fastdetect

Check the Multi, disk, rdisk, partition, for the one that says
default=........

MAKE SURE IT IS THE PARTITION WITH XP, as in the above case:
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS

which is the XP partition:
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect

If you get this wrong you will have a hard time recovering the boot process...

I did this once with XP and another, yet to be released OS, and I had to reformat everything.. so be careful.

I accidentally deleted the XP reference line, and set the default to the OS that I deleted.
the PC wouldn't boot.. :(

Be very careful with editting this file.
Welcome to TZ. Please keep us updated on your progress.

BB

[Nischint]

Thanks egghead and Big Booger, I'll try it tonight. I'll have to be really careful with my data on that drive, it's about 15 GB in there. :)

One more thing. After I have uninstalled Win98 and deleted the partition, will I get that 20 GB in my C Drive partition? Or will it remain an empty 20 GB partition? If so, how do I combine two or more partitions?

Another thing. I checked and all my partitions have FAT32 file systems. Should I change them all to NTFS? What are the advantages of an NTFS over FAT32? And moreover, if I have my main C Drive in a FAT32 file system, will it recognise an NTFS file system?

[Tinker]

Welcome to the forum, post often as we love a challenge. Please enjoy your stay.........:D

Originally posted by Nischint

Another thing. I checked and all my partitions have FAT32 file systems. Should I change them all to NTFS? What are the advantages of an NTFS over FAT32? And moreover, if I have my main C Drive in a FAT32 file system, will it recognize an NTFS file system?

A good read on NTFS (http://www.pcguide.com/ref/hdd/file/ntfs/)..........

FAT32 will not be able to see the NTFS data....... :mad:

[Nischint]

Thanks for the link, Tinker, it was extremely helpful. But although NTFS does seem to have its advantages, I don't think I'm gonna go for it. It'll be too much trouble to convert all my disks in NTFS and not to mention, I gotta find space for data worth 50 GB until, my hard disks are formatted. No way!!

So for now, I'll just uninstall Win98 and stick with the FAT32 file system. Problem is, I have 15 GB of data on this drive. What am I gonna shift it to? CD's? Nah, just too much porn and too much music...

[Ramchip]

Windows XP allows you to convert drives that have data on them to NTFS without reformatting. No need to move and recopy the data first. Just pull up the help and search for Convert...all the commands you need are documented there!

[Nischint]

Volumes converted from FAT to NTFS lack some performance benefits compared to volumes initially formatted with NTFS. On converted volumes, the MFT might become fragmented. In addition, on converted boot volumes, NTFS permissions are not applied after the volume is converted

That's what the XP Support had to say. Now my French isn't what it used to be, but does this mean that converting only one drive will get my comp messed up?? In addition to this, there's nothing mentioned about data loss. So I'm assuming that I will lose some data.

All this seems extremely complicated. And to think it started out with me wanting to just uninstall Win98 on one partition :)

What if I just delete the folders and files that are Win98 specific, and then remove the entry from the dual boot? Will it work?

Added later:

What's better? Converting a FAT32 into NTFS, or formatting it directly into NTFS?