mbr

rinux · 06-21-2003, 08:04 AM

hello everybody,
i have a problem with my hard disk, i installed linux on master boot record and i did have win 2000 srv and linux on my pc (pentium 2 ) and now i want to have only win 2000 srv

i know i have to format it but i did format then fdisk and format again but no way, they told me i have to make low level formatting but i don't have on my board this option is there any other solution ?? to get my hard clean again
THANKS

Gªutama · 06-21-2003, 08:20 AM

Doesn't win 2000 server clean it out pretty good if you just do a clean install of it.

If you want to zero the MBR use

dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/hda bs=512 count=1

This will set your MBR to all zeros so think before you run it

zmedico · 06-21-2003, 08:56 AM

#back up the mbr
dd if=/dev/hda of=mbr_backup_file bs=512 count=1

#restore the mbr
dd if=mbr_backup_file of=/dev/hda bs=512 count=1

2damncommon · 06-21-2003, 09:46 AM

Hello, rinux.
Your question is not entirely clear. What is the error you receive when trying to install Win 2K? Windows usually has no problem overwriting the MBR, but does have a problem deleting Linux partitions. Deleting the Linux partition can be done from your Linux install CD. Also, you can check the webpage of the hard drive maker for a utility disk if needed.

rinux · 06-21-2003, 01:58 PM

thanks a lot
i found the answer in another thread here i should have done
fdisk /mbr

this solved my problem