MAXTOR 160 ATA 100/133 reformat?

[bozobytes]

I have a Compaq 5011 that I want to add a MAXTOR 160 ATA 100/133 from a DELL 4300 P-4 computer The HDD is presently installed on the DELL 4300 computer that has a broken cmos battery clips to hold the battery,and I don't want any chance of loading up all the software,hardware,OS on the 4300, only to have battery problems and failure of crashing on the Dell.

When I powered up the 4300 Dell, a dos password prompt window was the first thing I saw. I don't know the password. I DO want to reformat this HDD before I install it into the Compaq.

Someone mentioned to me that I have to remove the jumpers on the motherboard to erase the password,then to reformat. I have tried to pull up the schematics/illustration of this DELL 4300 Motherboard to try to find these so called "jumpers" and I can not. I've used a magnifying glass and bright flashlights to help me find these, but to no avail.

Were they talking about the jumpers on the HDD itself? Can I reformat this HDD after I install it into the Compaq?

I was told that if I have the other compaq running Windows XP, I can not simply hook up the MAXTOR 160 ATA 100/133 to the Compaqs' 80 Ultra DMA and expect it to work,that first, I have to reformat the HD. Can't I do this when the computer recognizes the second HD as the Slave?

Thanks!

[Steve R Jones]

If you properly hook the drive up as a slave you can then format it.

Click on Start->Run and type: DISKMGMT.MSC
You should be able to figure out which drive it is...Right click and select format.

[SpywareDr]

Someone mentioned to me that I have to remove the jumpers on the motherboard to erase the password,then to reformat. I have tried to pull up the schematics/illustration of this DELL 4300 Motherboard to try to find these so called "jumpers" and I can not. I've used a magnifying glass and bright flashlights to help me find these, but to no avail.

Source: http://support.dell.com/support/edoc...ov.htm#1101668