Need help uninstalling linux

orfiyus · 06-02-2007, 12:41 AM

Hey

I am running fedora 6, it is currently my only OS. Anyway I decided I wanted to install windows. So I popped in the cd (after setting the bios to boot from the cd-rom) and I get a black screen with nothing happening. I have tried different copies and I kept getting this error. So I decided to erase linux and start from scratch.

I popped in the linux cd started a re-installation waited for the partitions to be deleted and turned off the pc mid install (yea that was probly a stupid idea). Turned on the comp and I got the same problem with the windows cd. I then let it boot by it self and it brought me to the grub menu (I didnt know wut to do with this). Anyway I reinstalled fc6 completely and this time I went into linux rescue mode and deleted all partitions thru the fdisk command. Again this didnt work linux booted up perfectly right after and the windows cd still goes to the black screen. I also tried this command as root
"dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/hda bs=521 count=1" which I read in a site through google would erase everything after being rebooted which didnt work either.

At this point I am willing to try anything to get windows installed. Any help would be appreciated. By the way thanks for reading through all this.

Peace

syg00 · 06-02-2007, 03:34 AM

Should have been "bs=512", but probably wouldn't matter.
If you can to a (Linux) terminal session let's see what this shows

Code:

dd if=/dev/hda count=1 | hexdump -C

wayno · 06-02-2007, 07:04 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by orfiyus

Hey

I am running fedora 6, it is currently my only OS. Anyway I decided I wanted to install windows. So I popped in the cd (after setting the bios to boot from the cd-rom) and I get a black screen with nothing happening. I have tried different copies and I kept getting this error. So I decided to erase linux and start from scratch.

I popped in the linux cd started a re-installation waited for the partitions to be deleted and turned off the pc mid install (yea that was probly a stupid idea). Turned on the comp and I got the same problem with the windows cd. I then let it boot by it self and it brought me to the grub menu (I didnt know wut to do with this). Anyway I reinstalled fc6 completely and this time I went into linux rescue mode and deleted all partitions thru the fdisk command. Again this didnt work linux booted up perfectly right after and the windows cd still goes to the black screen. I also tried this command as root
"dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/hda bs=521 count=1" which I read in a site through google would erase everything after being rebooted which didnt work either.

At this point I am willing to try anything to get windows installed. Any help would be appreciated. By the way thanks for reading through all this.

Peace

I've had something similar. For some reason when Windows doesn't recognise the file system, it just hangs rather than tell you something about it. You have to delete the partitions using a Linux live / rescue CD and let Windows have an empty disk.

orfiyus · 06-02-2007, 12:23 PM

I came across many similar topics across the internet last night without a clear solution. I just gave up and used a program called DBAN to erase the entire contents of the hard drive. Then I tried the windows cd and it worked. I did try the live cd (I used knoppix a friend gave me) I used the wipe and shred commands but it didnt work either. Maybe its a different command. Anyway Thanks to all those that replied.

Peace

angryfirelord · 06-02-2007, 01:03 PM

Never used DBAN, but when I have to delete or rezise partitions, I use the GParted LiveCD.

http://sourceforge.net/project/showf...kage_id=173828