This is a joke, right?
> Once you calm down and analyze the situation rationally, you'll find
> that the real culprit was Eudora or some other non-Microsoft app that
> you were running.
Okay, for the record, here's what happened.
JoeK wanted to run a DOS application that would not run in the "MS DOS"
command prompt in Windows NT 4.0. The first thing he did was
repartition the second physical disk so that the first 80% was NTFS and
the rest was DOS FAT.
Then, he ran the 6.22 DOS install procedure, which claimed that he
already had DOS installed. Which he didn't, unless you count the empty
FAT partition.
Now, DOS will only install on a disk labelled C. PERIOD.
So, JoeK had to turn off recognition of the first disk in the ROM
monitor to reboot the machine so that the FAT partition would be
labelled C. Which it was.
Next, JoeK installed DOS. And DOS said, "Oh. I need to reformat your
disk, 'cause you have DOS already installed." so JoeK said, "What the
heck, it sees the hard drive, and knows the proper format, so go ahead &
install."
Big mistake. So, it formats. And claims that it's formatted that 20%.
So JoeK reboots.
And he finds that actually it didn't format that partition. IT
REPARTITIONED THE WHOLE PHYSICAL DISK. So that the first half was a FAT
partition and the second half was undefined, thus deleting all the
information that was on the NTFS partition.
But that's not the end of our story. Because the partition is 2 Gig,
and from WinNT it says it's 2 Gig, but DOS only sees about 800 Meg.
So Joe's effectively missing about 1.2 Gig.
So DOS is on the FRONT of the second disk, and JoeK says "Fine, leave it
there." and he runs an installer program for some drivers. (This is
where joebar will say "Aha! Not Missy's problem!")
But somehow, the install program said, "I'm sorry, i can't install,
there's a problem with your disk" and exitted. And when JoeK rebooted,
his first physical disk was GONE.
Actually, not only GONE, but it thinks it's a FAT partition that's 100%
full and labelled "@!$%#^$^$#" (actually, they were untypable nonASCII
characters).
So JoeK is rebooted, NT is gone, it says the disk is corrupt, and JoeK
needs to run setup with his emergency repair disk to fix it.
So he runs setup, using the emergency repair disk, and it says, "I'm
examining your disk..." And then it locks up. So he figures he has to
install NT from scratch. Sigh.
So he runs setup and it says "I'm examining your disk..." And then IT
locks up.
So JoeK says, "To heck with NT, I'll put DOS on it first, and THEN put
NT on it." So he boots to DOS and tries to format the disk, and it
says, "I can't deal with this disk, I'm giving up now..." because it's a
4 Gig disk, and to DOS that is way too big a partition.
It doesn't even bother asking JoeK how big a chunk to take for the
install. It just chokes.
So he runs fdisk to repartition the disk. And to repartition, he has to
delete the existing partition. So he tells it to delete the partition,
and it says, "Are you sure?", and he says "Yes...", and it says, "Prove
it by typing in the volume label..." and he says, "No can do, compadre,
the characters are nonASCII and, quite frankly, untypable, even with one
of those crazy dvorak typewriters..."
So he 1) CAN'T FIX IT, 2) CAN'T INSTALL NT, 3) CAN'T INSTALL DOS, and 4)
CANT EVEN DELETE THE EXISTING PARTITION.
What to do, what to do?
After consulting with various experts (mind you, JoeK got into work this
morning at 9am, and it's now 3pm with no work done and work from
yesterday clobbered completely), JoeK decided that he had to use the
Adaptek ROM program to PHYSICALLY reformat the hard disk to get back to
a point where he could restart anything.
And now, at 3pm, he's just now finishing the base NT installation.
Six hours later. If everything is perfect, by tomorrow morning he will
have a usable machine again. Of course, he has to reinstall all his
software, redirect paths, redo all his preferences, remap the drives,
etc etc etc.
In the words of Joe Kiniry, "The machine's moving out of here in a week,
and I would rather die than use another Microsoft product. They make
third rate software, they are destroying our industry, they make people
who are good at computers want to quit computers... the last
contribution they made to mankind was Applesoft Basic!!! Visual Basic's
3 times slower than Java!!"
> At any rate, since I run NT on all my machines, I have to deal with this
> sort of problem all the time.
*grin*
> Give me a call if you want help.
Will do, thanks!
> Otherwise, just duct tape the holes in the disk and the motherboard,
> spray lemon pledge on everything to seal it up, and you'll find your
> problems are fixed.
\me crosses my fingers REAL tight...
> BTW Eve is here visiting the lab, or actually just Jim Gemmell since
> only he and I are here today.
Yikes!!! Eve's being held hostage at Microsoft until we agree to be
nice in our comments about NT!!! :)
> BTW is anyone out there reading Infinite Jest?
I tried picking it up last year when it came out, realized it was 1000
pages, realized I didn't have that much free time on my hands, and put
it down.
> It's pretty entertaining.
I know, one day I'll get to it...
> I should probably wait until I'm done with it before actually
> recommending it, but that will take a while.
Please do post commentary, I'd like to read it. In this Baudrillardian
world, my reading 10 reviews of the book is almost as good as reading
the book.
> PS. If there is some kernel (so to speak) of truth to Joe Kinry's
> machine being unbootable, let me know if I can help.
Unbootable without a hard format. I saw it myself.
----
adam@cs.caltech.edu
Every use of a Microsoft product take 5 minutes off your life
expectancy.
-- Joe Kiniry