remove dual boot

i dual boot 98 and xp pro on 2 hdd
c: is fat32 with 98 and d: is ntfs with xp
i don't need 98 and would love the space
how do i remove dual boot/98 os and let xp have both disks?
thanks

 

Make a repair disk just in case.

Dead easy to do if you don't mind having XP on the same partition as it is now and using the space you will be freeing up on C:

Boot to XP and -

1. Edit C:\boot.ini and remove the Win98 line(s). They should be obvious. If you have 98 as your default OS at boot time, change it to XP.

If you have 98 as your default, your boot.ini file probably looks something like

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=C:\
[operating systems]
C:\= "Microsoft Windows "
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS= "Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect

and you will want it to look like

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS= "Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect

or you can change the timeout value to anything including zero if you don't want to see it at all. With a single OS you may not see it in any case.

Now you can delete anything on C: except the following files in c:\ that are required for XP to be able to boot: NTLDR, NTDETECT.COM, and BOOT.INI. If you delete them, XP WILL NOT boot.

You're page file may be in c:\ as well. If so, leave it alone. If not, you will get slightly better performance if you move it there.

***********************************************

If you really, badly want to have XP on C:, it can be done but lots more and different steps.

 

thanks newt

can i use ntfs on c: or will the formatting wipe out those 3 critical files?

will xp be ok writing to one drive formatted as ntfs and the other as fat32?

is there enough advantage to ntfs over fat32 to justify setting up a second partition on c: that is ntfs and leaving those 3 files in a small fat32 partition?

any experience with dynamic volumes?

les

 

Don't format C: unless you absolutely have to. If you do, you will need to do a bunch of fancy stuff from the recovery console like fixboot and fixmbr. At least I think you can get a bootable system that way. Maybe.

NTFS will be fine on C: and you can just use the "convert" command to change over. The only systems I can think of that required a FAT partition for some system files were those that used the Digital Alpha chip. No intel systems need it.

I much prefer NTFS. More security options by far and IMO more stable and deals lots better with fragmentation. Besides which, since it uses 4K clusters regardless of drive size, more efficient at space utilization on a larger drive/partition (over 8Gb) than any flavor of FAT.

No first hand experience with dynamic volumes. If you decide to use them would love to hear how you get on.