Retrieving allocation units?

We had a computer being upgraded to win 2000 but had a problem that forced us to go back to step 0. Using my win 98 which I must install first as I have only a 2000 upgrade I Fdisked the HD a 2 gig to make one single partition then began reformat. It has been running for a long time (more than a day) it says it is trying to retrieve allocation units and is up to 400K+ but no sign of getting done. Is this a normal or is something wrong with this HD?
Thanks for any advice.

 

Hard Drive Testers

Sounds to me like the the Hard Drive's got issues...Download a Hard Drive tester for your brand of HD and run it. It will verify the HD is good or bad.

- For IBM/Hitachi - Drive Fitness Test
- For Fujitsu - Diagnostic Tool
- For Maxtor - PowerMax -->Also does Quantum
- For Samsung - Shdiag
- For Seagate - SeaTools Desktop
- For Western Digital - DLG Diagnostic

 

Wow, Dobhar...now that's a rocking reply!

 

continuing

Thanks for the references I am sure they are going to come in very handy. I am going to try swapping out the HD first. If that works I will come bact to this HD later and run the diagnostic. Doing a lot of playing with HDs this run so will keep this thread updated.

 

Thanks Chiles4...

robwhite...the only tool that I personally have not used yet is the Samsung and IBM\Hitachi tool so I can't tell you how good of a job they do. Maybe someone else can comment on them.