[jefffferzbooboo6912]

When ever I try to do a fresh Win 95 install on a recently formatted hard drive, it says "drive is compressed" and will not let me go any further. It was formatted, so it shouldn't be compressed. I've tried other hard drives also, and I get the same message. How do I "uncompress" the hard drive, is there a program or something?

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Yes, there is a program, it's called Killdisk, there's another called DBAN, either will completely write your drive to zeros so you can start completely fresh.Killdisk works faster, DBAN is more through. Just Google either name with +download. However when you try to install a different operating system on a used disk it's best to first remove any and all old partitions, put new ones on and then format the drive. You probably have some intormation in the old master boot record or the boot sector that is causing problems.

[Tyger]

Yes, there is a program, it's called Killdisk, there's another called DBAN, either will completely write your drive to zeros so you can start completely fresh.Killdisk works faster, DBAN is more through. Just Google either name with +download. However when you try to install a different operating system on a used disk it's best to first remove any and all old partitions, put new ones on and then format the drive. You probably have some intormation in the old master boot record or the boot sector that is causing problems.

[pip22]

You can't format a compressed drive. First you have to delete or remove the compression, which destroys all the data on that drive.

There were two types of DOS compression from Microsoft. The first was called "DoubleSpace" and this was superceded by "DriveSpace", both essentially the same. To remove the compression you need to boot up from a DOS floppy, then issue one of the following commands at the DOS A:>prompt:

(The command executables for drvspace or dblspace are on the DOS startup disk which Windows allows you to create.

For DoubleSpace compression type this command: DBLSPACE /DEL C:

For DriveSpace compression type this command: DRVSPACE /DEL C:

If you don't know which to use, just try the first one. If it's wrong you'll get an error message such as "unknown command", in which case try the second option. As far as I can remember, DBLSPACE (DoubleSpace) was provided with Windows 3.1, and DRVSPACE (DriveSpace) came in with Windows 98.

I cannot remember, long time since I used DOS) but you may then have to re-partition the C: drive before formatting it. Try FORMAT C: and if it works, then obviously it doesn't need re-partitioning.

Edited by pip22, 15 May 2007 - 12:48 PM.