Well so what was on E before? Was it NTFS? Was it a primary partition? Was there an extended partition with D and E as the logical drives? I think we need more information.

This is a P133 machine so probably FAT16 and D is definitely on the extended drive. FDISK reports the correct size that D and E would normally occupy but doesn't "see" E.

I think I know what you're getting at regarding "primary". I would have thought only C would be primary but then why is D showing up.

On second thought, this is just over 4gb drive so maybe it's more than dos can address and I had to settle for C and D initially. After installing 95 I may have created E from there... would that be FAT32 then? Maybe that's why I can't see it. Is there a newer version of FDISK that can see FAT32?

Another thought... Is there anything at all I can turn into a boot floppy that I can use to temporarily access a FAT32 volume (assuming that's the problem) A quick google search says dos 7.1 reads FAT32 but I can't find a boot floppy for it. I guess it's too big?

I just need to access this drive long enough to install W95 and I'm good after that.

Gahhhrrrlic wrote on 2023-04-23, 21:20:

Another thought... Is there anything at all I can turn into a boot floppy that I can use to temporarily access a FAT32 volume (assuming that's the problem) A quick google search says dos 7.1 reads FAT32 but I can't find a boot floppy for it. I guess it's too big?

I just need to access this drive long enough to install W95 and I'm good after that.

Windows 9x and DOS have a limitation regarding partitioning: you're only allowed to have one primary partition per disk. What this means is that if you want more "drive letters" than C on one disk, they have to reside within an extended partition. FDISK will ask, when you create an extended partition, if you want to use all the available space on it for a new volume. If you choose 'no', you get to set the amount of space used for second volume, and then again asked for the amount space for the third volume etc.

This however doesn't explain why you were able to use drive E before you wiped Windows and booted into DOS.

Does W95 do something to the DOS files that allow you to see F32 partitions?

As a band-aid, anything that boots off a floppy and can read F32 will do, if you have any suggestions?

EDIT:

Wait a minute... W95 runs on FAT16 still. The problem here must have something to do with the size of the volume DOS can address or whether it's "primary" or not or something else... I don't see how the file system would be FAT32.

OK I was able to solve the problem.

For anyone who has the same issue and wants the quick answer, use Windows ME boot disk. Apparently, whatever version of DOS it uses is able to see all your drives. 6.22 cannot.

Windows 95 can be fat32, osr2 onwards brought fat32 but that was oem only at the time. So a dos 6.22 boot disk wouldnt work.
I tried the same earlier as I have win95 and win3.11 on the same drive, both run fine only problem Im finding is the awedrivers for win3.11 wont install because its dos 7.1, and I cant boot dos 6.22 because no fat32 drivers.

Do you have more than one primary partition?
DOS just can see FAT16 partitions.
Win95B up to WinME are able to see one primary FAT32 partition plus one primary FAT16 partition.

I don't think so... but ME boot disk was able to see it, so I guess it has a more recent version of dos running.

Yeah DOS 6.22 can't see FAT32 partitions.

Windows 95 OSR2+ can see them. I should have thought of that.

Gahhhrrrlic wrote on 2023-04-23, 22:02:

OK I was able to solve the problem.

For anyone who has the same issue and wants the quick answer, use Windows ME boot disk. Apparently, whatever version of DOS it uses is able to see all your drives. 6.22 cannot.

It never occurred for me to ask if you were booting an older operating system to launch the installation. I assumed you were using a Windows 95 bootdisk (DOS 7, I think). Naturally DOS versions older than the one bundled with Windows 95 can't deal with FAT32 and large disks.

Glad to learn you were able to figure it out, though.

Well.. Technically speaking, it is possible for older DOS versions to handle FAT32.

a) There's the method of using a TSR that makes FAT32 appears as a remote network drive.
Some NTFS drivers (read-only) use that method.

b) Using the Installable File System (IFS) feature.
- DOS 4.0 had it at one point in time, but it was removed in later releases. Maybe in 4.01 already?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Installable_File_System

That's just a technical point of view, of course.
In practice no FAT32 support is available to classic DOS (yet).