Format A31 "C" Drive

I just got an A31 (2652 J3U) from an IT guy who thought he was helping me by installing Tiny XP, a smaller, quicker version of XP, this OS is useless, so I want to install my legal XP Pro Corporate SP1, but I get a mesage that I cannot install it because my version is older than the Tiny XP currently on my A31. I assume that I will have to format my "C" drive then begin from scratch. I am not much of a techie, a newbie on the A31, so can you explain to me in simple point form how to format the "C" drive on my A31? I assume after the formatting that I will start my machine using F12, then select the CD as the first boot hardware, then the XP Pro install window ought to open up automatically from which I can begin the install process. I also got all the drivers for this A31 model from the Lenovo site, assume that I will install those after installing XP Pro, then install all my security software, then install all the updates from Microsoft. Am I on the right track? Will this work? Thanks, Ken.

Any XP installation disk should have the ability to format the drive as a part of the installation process.
Cheers,
George
In daily use: R60F, R500F, T61, T410
Collecting dust: T60
Enjoying retirement: A31p, T42p,
Non-ThinkPads: Panasonic CF-31 & CF-52, HP 8760W
Starting Thursday, 08/14/2014 I'll be away from the forums until further notice. Please do NOT send private messages since I won't be able to read them. Thank you.

Similar Messages

How to format an external drive for mac AND pc use

i want to format my external drive so i can use it on my mac and on pc's as well. i've gathered that the MS-DOS format is the way to go. my question is this: would this create any problems for my mac then?
can i partion one part for ms-dos and part for macos extended?
cheers
-j-

MS-DOS format (or FAT32) will be fine for both Mac and PC. However there is a 4GB file size limit with FAT32.
You could use a dual partition, however the HFS+ partition would not be readable by the PC unless you installed the third party MacDrive.
Look at this page for more information on a dual partition drive for Mac and Windows.
http://macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20030613121738812
iFelix

How do I format an external drive with mountain lion?

How do I format an external drive with mountain lion?

Applications > Utilities > Disk Utility
select the external drive in the left pane
partition and format in the right pane

Disk utility reports "Device could not be opened" - error when trying to format a new drive in a Mac Pro 1,1

MacPro 1,1 Quadcore 3 GHz (2006 "Woodcrest")
32 GB RAM
ATI Radeon HD 5770
OS X 10.7.5 Lion
I have encountered the following behavior when trying to format a new drive with disk utility. This description has also been send via the Mac Pro feedback as a bug report to Apple.
On searching the web and forums with this particular error message and behaviour I could not find any usful results. So maybe the following description may be helpful for some users.
Best regards.
1. Drive Bay 1 contains the original 250 GB Startupdisk. It works without errors.
2. Drive Bays 3 and 4 contain each a WD Caviar Black 2 TB SATA 3 HDD. They work without errors.
3. I have purchased a third WD Caviar Black 2 TB HDD.
4. In Drive Bay 2 there has been a Seagate 750 GB HDD, which worked in conjunction with all the other drives without error.
5. I exchanged the Seagate HDD in Drive Bay 2 with the new WD Caviar Black 2 TB HDD.
6. On starting the system, it will report to initialize the new drive.
7. On trying to initialize the new drive with disk utility it reports the error [translated from German] "Erasing of the volume has failed. The device could not be opened."
8. I thought that the drive is faulty. Thus I created an RMA-Case at WD. They exchanged the drive without problems.
9. On getting the exchanged WD Caviar Black 2 TB drive I put it in Drive Bay 2 as before.
10. On trying to erase and format the exchange drive I got the same error message "Drive could not be opened."
10.1 On selecting the physical drive in the devices list, disk utility reports all information in the bottom area of its window as usual, e. g. hard disk description, connection bus, type and place, capacity, write status, SMART-status, partition scheme.
10.1 On leaving that drive selected in the devices list and clicking the info-button, disk utility will also report additional information as usual, e. g. Name, Type, partition scheme, media-identification, media name, media type, device tree, … , number of relocated sectors, etc.. All this information appears to be valid, as can be compared to the other devices information inside the other Drive Bays. Also the disk numbering scheme appears to be standard - 4 HDDs give the numbering disk0, disk1, disk2, disk3.
10.2 From that information I conclude that the SATA-bus and connectors electrically work properly, the drive has spun up and can be accessed by the system normally.
11. I powered down the computer, took out the HDDs from Drive Bays 3 and 4 and put the caddy with the new exchange drive in Drive Bay 4 [Maybe, I could have also just left it alone in Drive Bay 2, or 3].
12. After powering on the system, disk utility will quick format the exchange drive without any error message. Also, when erasing again by selecting the option to write zeros to the drive, disk utility will finish without error.
13. After disk utility finished formatting, I put back the original drives into Drive Bay 3 and 4 and put the now newly formatted drive back into Drive Bay 2.
14. After switching on the computer the system start and login proceeds without any error message. All drives appear as expected on the desktop.

If anyone is reading this still looking for what caused the issue and how to fix it here is what I discovered.
The antivirus program our company uses, Bitdefender Antivirus Plus, was causing some of the PDF files not to open. After troubleshooting the different modules and settings the culprit was..
Scan SSL in Privacy Control Settings. Turning it OFF solved the problem and all the PDF files that previously would not open now open just fine. This issue has been sent to Bitdefender for them to review. If you use a different antivirus program and are having this issue try locating the Scan SSL setting and see if turning it off solves the problem.

MacBook Pro crashed while deleting old backups off partitioned external hard drive. Now only recognizes windows formatted half of drive. Can the Apple side be saved?

MacBook Pro 15-inch, Mid 2010
Processor 2.66 GHz Intel Core i7
Memory 8 GB 1067 MHz DDR3
Graphics NVIDIA GeForce GT 330M 512 MB
Software OS X 10.9.5 (13F34)
I have an external hard drive:
2 TB Seagate Backup+Desk Media
Partitioned:
1TB - Windows NTFS
1TB - Mac (sorry I can't remember the formatting, whatever Mavricks asked me to use...)
What happened:
I was erasing 3 old backups from the Apple partition and my laptop crashed part way through emptying the trash. (it has done this many times before, where parts of the screen are frozen in square blocks displaced all over the screen. Screenshot not possible unless I use a separate camera).
When I force restarted my computer (holding down the power button) neither side of the drive was accessible. After running the Disk Utility and Verifying and Repairing the Disk Permissions and the Disk Itself (for the Windows side) I was able to access the Windows partition. However, upon attempting to do so with the Mac partition it tells me that it cannot be repaired. I have found many forums discussing SIMILAR situations but none with the same and here is why:
Up until this happening I could access ONLY the Windows partition when the drive was connected to either my Apple laptop in Bootcamp Windows 7 or my HP laptop in Vista, while my MacBook could access both sides of the drive. HOWEVER, after this crash, BOTH my Windows 7 and Vista can access both sides of the drive (so My files are still all there and accessible) but my MacBook Pro swears that the Apple partition is doomed.
Since the Apple side of my laptop is my primary workhorse I really want to figure out how to fix my drive.
So Questions:
1. Anything else I can provide to the experts out there to help me get this fixed?
2. Can I custom fix this via accessing the drive on either of the Windows systems?
3. Why would it suddenly show up in Windows when it became unaccessible to Mac?
Thanks All!

UPDATE:
It has been maybe a month since this happened.
After I made this post and was checking emails, walking away from computer, and then came back my Mac partition of the External Drive has shown up on the Desktop...
So, in the ever immortal way of asking the tech to come check the issue and the issue resolving itself, perhaps I should posted on the forum sooner...
NOTE: The disk still shows up as unusable in the Disk Utility and it appears that the files are read only (cannot make a new folder on this side of the external drive)
I still consider this a volatile issue because I do not want to lose the files on this half of the partition and I have not gotten a replacement drive yet (too much data to move to my computer and then format the current drive)

Windows computer says 'Format disk in drive E' when I plug in iPod. Will this erase everything?

When I plug my iPod nano into my Windows laptop, it says 'Format disk in drive E'. Will this lose everything if I do this?

Hello,
I'd ask in the Windows forum on Microsoft Community.
Karl
When you see answers and helpful posts, please click Vote As Helpful, Propose As Answer, and/or Mark As Answer.
My Blog: Unlock PowerShell
My Book: Windows PowerShell 2.0 Bible
My E-mail: -join ('6F6C646B61726C40686F746D61696C2E636F6D'-split'(?<=\G.{2})'|%{if($_){[char][int]"0x$_"}})

I format my hard drive and now dont have a sync key to access to my account, please help me!

Please Help me! My computer was infected by a virus, and I format my hard drive and reinstall the OS. Now I installed Firefox 4 beta 10 but don't have access to my sync account because i don't the "Sync Key" and don't use Firefox in other devices... please please help me to access to my account I need recover my bookmarks and configuration, Thanks.

Sorry, without your Sync Key you're out of luck. It is used as the decryption key for the data that is stored on the Sync server.

Can't open disk utility at startup, can't format new hard drive

My hard drive on my 2011 macbook pro recently went out, so I purchased a new one. I plugged it in internally and brought up disk utility in internet recovery, but it didn't recognize the drive. So I tried using an external hard drive reader, but now recovery mode can't be accessed at all, whether I press option or command r after startup, it still gives me the same gray folder with a question mark icon. Is my recovery mode damaged, and is that possible to fix?

You can use an external USB disk/flash drive which has Recovery (or a full OS - requires a 16GB disk space on a USB flash or a JHFS+ partition with the OSX) on it. Boot from that recovery USB drive. if Internet Recovery worked once, the MBP is already capable of repeating it. It requires an Ethernet or WiFi connection. If neither is available, or is spotty, Internet Recovery will not work. Can you try Internet recovery via Ethernet cable, if all your previous attempts have been via WiFi?
If the drive is not recognized when plugged into the internal SATA bus, either a cable is not plugged in properly (the replacement drive never showed up successfully as per the OP even once, or the drive is DoA). It should be tested externally. Pulling the drive out and putting it back is fairly easy in the 2011/2012 MBPs. The cable could have been damaged during the replacement. The non-drive end of SATA/IR Sensor cable on the main logic board could be loose or damaged.
If you have a external cable SATA-to-USB or SATA-to-FW (very unlikely), format the new drive using a different PC/MAC to make sure it is not DoA. What brand/model is this new drive? Is it an SSD? It may require a FW upgrade.
If there is a second MAC available, a Target Disk Mode boot (press T while powering up the mac with the new drive) may allow the second working mac to format the new drive via Disk Utility.

Can i use windows migration assistant to transfer files from my windows formatted external hard drive to my mac?

I have a windows formatted external hard drive and a macbook pro. I was wondering if i could use the windows migration assistant to transfer files from my external hard drive to the mac

No.
Just connect the drive to your Mac. The Mac can read most Windows formats (it cannot WRITE Windows New Technology File System (NTFS) formatted drives.

Formatting a PC-formatted External Hard Drive to work in Mac OS

So I have a 300 gig external hard drive formatted for Windows XP with NTFS. I recently got a Macbook Pro and as it stands in Mac OS X the hard drive is read only. I can copy files from the hard drive to my Mac, but I can't edit files on the external HD or copy from my Mac to my external HD. This of course is a problem and so I need to reformat it to work in Mac OS. While I will not be using PCs anymore, if possible I would like for the external HD to be Mac and Windows compatible.
First things first I have to get all 300 gigs of files off the external HD in order to reformat it. This will be a pain but I have the means to do this. Once I get everything off, how and with what method should I reformat it to work in Mac? Should I use the HFS file system or MS-DOS? Also, what utility in Mac OS lets me reformat it. As I said, I probably won't be hooking up this external HD to Windows anytime soon, but if there is a way to format it in Mac to work with Windows, then fine.
So what exactly are my options here? I understand that I can format the hard drive in Mac OS with either MS-DOS or FAT32. I just don't know which is better/faster/more reliable in Mac OS, as I'm still a Mac newbie. I don't have files that are over 2 gigs as far as I remember, so I don't think that will be an issue. If it helps, it is mostly media files (videos, music). I've read up online about formatting a drive to work with Mac OS, but there's just so much info I'm getting confused. Thanks.

Thanks for the suggestions so far.
So from what people are saying, I can format the drive in Mac OS as FAT32 (aka MS-DOS) and it will work fine between the two operating systems.
I've been reading more though and it seems that FAT32 drives can not be larger than 130 gigs? Or is that just for partitions.
I have a 350 gig hard drive and I don't plan on having any partitions. Can I just format the drive as FAT32 in Mac OS and the whole 350 gigs will be available? There's so much conflicting info in articles I've been reading.
thanks

How do I move my Outlook emails, currently viewed on Mozilla Firefox v26, to an external hard drive while I format my C drive?

I am using Windows 7 Ultimate 32 bit version. I have been viewing my Outlook email and contacts via Mozilla Firefox v26. However I have got to format my C drive to get rid of a malfunction. How do I move my emails and my contacts from the C drive to an external drive? I need to do this so as not to lose all my email information. I would then want to restore it to Mozilla Firefox 26 after I have formatted the C drive and reloaded Firefox? I would very grateful for any detailed information about how I go about this!
Nick Bannister

Firefox doesn't store your email or contacts, it displays that data from the webmail server that you connect to with Firefox.

Format an external drive from mac to pc

How do I format an external drive (My Passport) from mac to pc (iOS Snow Leopard) without losing my data?

kwnola wrote:
How do I format an external drive (My Passport) from mac to pc (iOS Snow Leopard) without losing my data?
1: Remove the data off the drive
You can do this by installing MacDrive on the Windows PC to access the Mac HTFS+ format
Or you can use a Mac to remove the data.
2: Format the drive on the PC (preferably) by right clicking on the drive and choosing format
A: If data on the drive will have larger than 4GB sized files, then the format you want is exFAT
(if your using Windows XP, you can download exFAT from Microsoft)
B: If the data on the drive will always have less than 4GB sized files, then you should choose FAT32 for most compatibility with all other machines.
3: If you can only format the drive on the Mac then open Apple's Disk Utility in the Utilities folder
Select the drive on the far left, it should have the makers name and a size, then click Partition.
Now select the box and click Options: MBR Then select Format: exFAT or MSDOS (FAT32) and click Apply.
4: If any chance you need to secure delete any data remaining on the drive form being recovered, use the Erase with Zero (or 7x for very secure) before formatting.
Note: Formatting a drive on the PC there will be a option for NTFS, this is for access by Windows only, but software can be installed on the Mac to read/write this format.
If you use exFAT or FAT32, the Mac can read and write this format just like Windows can, no need for extra software.
Linux can read/write just about any format.

How to Format Toshiba Hard-Drive for Mac with Parallels?

Hello,
I recently bought a Toshiba Hard-Drive with the following features:
500GB
It is a Canivo Basics 3.0
It is USB 3.0 and 2.0 portable hard drive
It has already been formatted NTFS for Windows XP, Vista, 7, and 8
The box says that it can be reformatted for Mac
I have a Macbook Pro with Retina Display that I bought this year in late March/early April.
It runs OS X Mavericks, and Parallels Desktop 9 for Mac.
I would like to reformat it so that I can use it on my laptop both with Windows and Mac OS at the same time. I do not wish to use a partition as I want to access the hard drive through Mac and Windows at the same time on my laptop and I also want to be able to access the Mac things on a Windows computer and vice versa.
I have never formatted a hard drive before, and I would like to use a completely safe software, or no software at all, if it is possible.
I am sorry but I don't have a very high knowledge of this.
Thanks,
Sandy-Wood

It would be easier, using Parallels, just to format the drive for "Mac OS Extended (Journaled)". You can see it both in the Windows/Parallels and the Mac side. Leaving it formatted as NTFS is not going to allow you to access (write to) the drive unless you use third-party software. Formatting it for Mac lets you use it, as I said, on both the Parallels VM and the Mac side.
If you were using Boot Camp, I would advise leaving it formatted as NTFS and purchasing NTFS for Mac to access the drive on both OS's. You can mitigate that by formatting the drive for Mac:
Good luck,
Clinton

Can I install my time machine back up onto a properly formatted external hard drive?

I have a MacBook Pro with a 750GB harddrive, with 500+ Gb of data on it. Just before I traverse to Europe, I did a TimeMachine back up.
I now want to give my Mac to a friend, and buy a AirMac when I get home. Even if I get the one with the largest drive it will not hold the full 500+'back up.
I have an 8 year old Mac Book pro at home as well. It will be a few months before I can buy the new AirMac. So my question is ....
Can I install my current backup on a properly formatted external hard drive, and will it then run like a computer --until I get my new AirMac?
Thanks for your help (and please don't be too tough on me for what may see to de a dumb question)
Soper777

The Time Machine backup is not bootable
You will have to install Leopard first

Mac novice needs to know how to format an external drive

How do I format a memory stick or external hard drive? I remember in PCs you could right click and click on format.
Thanks!

In OS X, there's an app called Disk Utility that allows you to do whatever you want with hard drives and external drives.
In order to format an external drive, read > http://pondini.org/OSX/DU1.html The Pondini's site guides you through the steps, so you just have to follow them. Unfortunately, it's not as easy as right-clicking the external drive

Format A31 "C" Drive

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for