Format IDE hard disk with WinUAE

[jman]

Hello,

I know this is one most asked question on earth but I really don't find an answer that fits my doubts.

I have an 3,5" IDE Fujitsu MPC3032AT (I think it's 3.2gb) and I want to use it on the A4000 I'm restoring. Probably I will eventually stick to CF solution but for the moment I'll do with what I have here.

I've started WinUAE with this disk attached (through a IDE-to-USB connector). It is not recognized by HDtoolbox (started with scsi.device), but I can setup my own CHS using this manual. Unfortunately I can only trust the cylinders and heads values, all the rest is left to HDtoolbox guess.

From now on everything I try (low level format, partition, etc.) is stopped by WinUAE and this error is shown:

Block zero attempt but drive has one or more mounted PC partitions.
Erase the drive or unmount all PC partitions first

This is has been added in WinUAE 2.3.2 on purpose.

1) Is it really necessary to specify all the real values to HDtoolbox for the disk? I wouldn't know how to calculate blocks per track and block per cylinder.
2) Do I have to give up using an external USB and open a PC (with an IDE connector) and attach it for real?

Thanks.

[terexuk]

try this then partition and reformat

http://eab.abime.net/showpost.php?p=715736&postcount=3

[Gordon]

My advice is check disk managment in windows. Go to control panel -> administration tools -> computer managment. Then on the left click disk managment, this shows you all the disks connected to your hard drive. Dont touch disk 0. NEVER. you may see it as Disk1 but make sure. then make dsk 1 is ONE partition. if its not then winuae wont reconise.

[thomas]

Originally Posted by Gordon

My advice is check disk managment in windows. Go to control panel -> administration tools -> computer managment. Then on the left click disk managment, this shows you all the disks connected to your hard drive. Dont touch disk 0. NEVER. you may see it as Disk1 but make sure. then make dsk 1 is ONE partition. if its not then winuae wont reconise.

That's exactly the opposite of what you need to do. As long as there is at least one partition on the drive, WinUAE won't accept it as Amiga harddrive. One is one too much. You need to delete all partitions. You might even need to delete the MBR. Use the diskpart method linked above. If Windows Disk Management shows the drive as uninitialized, then it's ready for WinUAE.

[Gordon]

Originally Posted by thomas

That's exactly the opposite of what you need to do. As long as there is at least one partition on the drive, WinUAE won't accept it as Amiga harddrive. One is one too much. You need to delete all partitions. You might even need to delete the MBR. Use the diskpart method linked above. If Windows Disk Management shows the drive as uninitialized, then it's ready for WinUAE.

Maybe I didnt explain it to well but i have prerpared many HDs like this. I have it formatted so its unppartitioned(not 1 like i said, i have read up and understood) and i always format it in windows with NTFS and its always reconised it

[cosmicfrog]

if its formated how can it be unpartioned ????

take a deep breath and start again

I usualy set winuae to use ide0 then I can use scsi.device in the amiga enviroment

[fitzsteve]

I suspect Gordon is using an old version of WinUAE with the Harddrive saftey check disabled, hence why he can prep a NTFS formatted HDD in WinUAE. I think newer versions of WinUAE do not allow this and you need to use an Raw uninitialized Drive as Thomas suggests.

This is certainly the way I do things anyway

[Gordon]

Originally Posted by cosmicfrog

if its formated how can it be unpartioned ????

take a deep breath and start again

No need to be patronising is there?


Ive done it now on my win 7 PC. Im using winuae 2.3. I plug in my ide adapter to my usb port and connct my 2.5 hard drive in. I go to computer management, and format to ntfs. I open up winuae, i add the hard drive as IDE0. i load up with my install.adf and it finds it. I havent tried it "uniiitisied" becuase ive never had to.

[jman]

Originally Posted by terexuk

try this then partition and reformat

http://eab.abime.net/showpost.php?p=715736&postcount=3

This seems to be working. At least I could partition the disk. Then started a "low level format" that apparently took forever, so I quit after thirty seconds or something of no visual feedback.

Upon restart I see DH0 and DH1. I've started partitioning the first one but it got stuck somewhere near 10%. Rebooted and tried the quick format, all smooth.

Tried installing the operating sytem on dh0:, again stuck at 12%.

I blame all this to the bad shape of the disk, I'll try with another one.

However there's still one issue open: how could I find the right values to complete this table and take advantage of the full disk?
Cylinders..................6704
Heads......................15
Blocks per Track........??
Blocks per Cylinder....??

HDtoolbox thinks the drive is 500mb, I'd like to take full advantage of the available space. Any idea?

Thank you all so much for your hints!

[thomas]

Then started a "low level format"

How did you come to this idea? Never try a low level format on an IDE disk. It does not work anyway. And even if it worked, it is rather stupid to do this after initialising the disk because llf formats the entire disk including the partition table. You would have to start all over again afterwards.

Just keep away from the low level format button.

Similarly keep away from the normal format button. There is no format command for hard drives, so there is no need to stress the driver with unnecessary write operations. Just use quick format. It's very fast and completely sufficient.

how could I find the right values to complete this table

Click on "read configuration".

Or find the highest LBA (a.k.a. number of [user] sectors/blocks) of the disk and fill in the fields so that Cylinders * Heads * Blocks per Track = highest LBA. Blocks per Cylinder is Blocks per Track * Heads.

[jman]

Originally Posted by thomas

Just keep away from the low level format button.

lol, you're right. I wanted to check if the drive was ok, sort of a checkdisk. But then I did from Windows directly (no issues by the way) and reformatted under WinUAE.

Originally Posted by thomas

Click on "read configuration".

Or find the highest LBA (a.k.a. number of [user] sectors/blocks) of the disk and fill in the fields so that Cylinders * Heads * Blocks per Track = highest LBA. Blocks per Cylinder is Blocks per Track * Heads.

I'll try reading the manual and find the LBA, I still cannot complete the operating system install, still stuck at 12%. I don't know if this is because of a hardware issue or bad formatting parameters...

EDIT: currently the disk pin is on CABLE SELECT. Should I set it to master or it doesn't matter?

thanks!

[thomas]

currently the disk pin is on CABLE SELECT. Should I set it to master or it doesn't matter?

When you put it into the Amiga you should set it to Master. For the PC it depends on the USB adapter you use.

[cosmicfrog]

sorry gordon if you thought I was patronising you, i did`t intend too, just my lack of grammer and lothing of typeing But what I ment is your description of the problem did`t make sense to me

I tell you one thing though I wish I knew as much as thomas about HDD`s and amigas

also when formating a HDD in winuae its best if its empty/unformated though u probably already know this

[jman]

Ok,

enough googling finally produced the info needed to properly setup this little bastard, I'll write them into stone for the next lost soul that has to cope with a FUJITSU MPC3032AT:

Cylinders.................6704
Heads.....................15
Sectors....................63
Bytes per Sector.......512
Blocks per Track.......63
Blocks per Cylinder...945
LBA........................6.335.280 (sectors in LBA mode)

The reported size by the partitioning tool of HDtoolbox is correct, but I can't exit nor save changes, hdtoolbox looks freezed after I setup my partitions.

The disk look good when NTFS formatted in Windows.

What else can I try? :-( At the moment I have no other working disk under 4gb.

[thomas]

hdtoolbox looks freezed

Do not use IDE0 controller with WinUAE 2.3.2.

[jman]

Originally Posted by thomas

Do not use IDE0 controller with WinUAE 2.3.2.

AAAAARRRRGHHHHH!!!!!!!

IDE support is broken in 2.3.2!!!!
After reading your words, I've googled a bit and immediately arrived at your thread! If only I knew this I would have spared this poor old disk endless cycles of formatting and partitioning trying to figure out what I was doing wrong...

Anyway, using WinUAE current 2.3.3 beta 1 seems to have fixed this, I could successfully install WB on the disk, that is what is important. The procedure described in the previous posts is 100% accurate.

Thank you Thomas, your help was really appreciated! Oh and by the way nice Amiga you have ;-)

Reading this thread, was an answer reached? I've been trying to setup a 4GB drive for use in a Amiga 600 using WinUAE.

I’ve had some issues when partitioning the drive in WinUAE. Running as an A600 using WB2.1 (or 1200 & WB3.1) with the HDD selected as IDE0 (WinUAE for 1200). Everything is visible in HDToolBox.

It allows me to change drive, then partition drive into 3 (HD0, 1 & 2). Then when I save changes I get told I have one or more mounted PC partitions and to erase these first.

I used DiskPart from the command to clean on the PC (drive no longer opens on the PC), but now when working in either WB it also cannot see the drive to go through the above steps. Its been setup as a HDD in the options but nothing appears in WB.

I have SwissKnife so I can reformat the drive back to FAT32 (or 16 if I wanted) as Windows can’t format the drive anymore. Returning it to a PC drive gives visibility again in windows and in WB but same error about mounted PC partitions occurs.

I feel I’m close, what am I missing.

[thomas]

Try DiskPart with these commands:

clean
create partition primary
delete partition

This should leave an MBR without partitions on the disk. Now WinUAE should be able to determine its size.

Don't forget to run WinUAE as administrator when working with real harddrives.

Make sure that you select IDE0 as controller and check Read/write.

Great thanks. Do I do all 3 of those commands in DiskPart, 1 after each other or try each 1 in turn?

create the partition seems to have worked. Thanks. After resting the system HD0, 1 and 2 are now on the desktop.