Win2000 corrupts NT4 partitions on dual-boot systems

[Robert Kriss]

Here is a description of the problem:

ENVIRONMENT:
PC-compatible system with 3 Operating Systems installed on a 60 GB drive:

Primary Win98 FAT32 visible only by Win98
Primary NT4 WKST NTFS 1.2 visible only by NT4
Primary WIN2KPRO NTFS 3.0 visible only by W2K

plus a few NTFS 1.2 logical partitions created in NT4's Disk Administrator,
and a few NTFS 3.0 logical partitions created in Windows 2000.
It is all successfully managed by System Commander 4.021 Deluxe.

PROBLEM:
The problem appears when Windows 2000 Pro is booted. Windows 2000 modifies the NT4's NTFS 1.2 logical partitions despite the fact that they have no letter mappings for these partitions in Win2000 and also the indexing is switched off for these partitions. Consequently, when Windows 2000 is exited and Windows NT 4 is booted, no data is lost on these partitions, but some of the operations cannot be performed any longer
on these partitions, for example:

1) Diskeeper 6.0 refuses to defragment these modified NTFS partitions
2) Error-Checking cannot be performed on these partitions

It turns out that Windows 2000 Pro has automatically changed the NTFS format on these partitions from version 1.2 to version 3.0. It all happens without any notification, message or prompt for user's consent.

Formating these partitions in back to NTFS 1.2 works only as long as one doesn't boot to Win2000, otherwise the NTFS partitions get corrupted and become NTFS 3.0 again.

QUESTION:
Is there a way to stop Windows 2000 modify (convert NTFS 1.2 to 3.0) these partitions?
Windows 2000 Service Pack 1 has not resolved this problem and my NT4 partitions
still get corrupted by Windows 2000. Thank you for any suggestions

Robert Kriss
[email protected]

[THE MICK]

For WIN 2000 to see WIN NT 4.0 NTFS correctly you need to have Service pack 4.0 or higher on the NT 4.0 install...

THE MICK

[gshayes]

Diskeeper not being to defragment the partitions that have been converted is a limitation of Diskeeper. There are other defraggers out there that do not have this problem. I would suggest contacting Executive Software and ask them why Diskeeper is unable to do so when others can.

CHKDSK under Windows NT 4.0 only knows about NTFS4 file system - not NTFS5 file system - which is why it will not work. This is a MS issue - however, good luck getting them to do anything about it. You might check out NTFSCheck from Sysinternals (http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/freeware/NTFSCHK.shtml).

Greg/Raxco Software

Disclaimer: I work for Raxco Software, the maker of PerfectDisk 2000 - a competitor of Diskeeper, as a systems engineer in the support department.

[Thomas P]

Hi there,
I am Dualbooting my Toshiba Notebook with NT4/2000 and got problems with the APM software provided from Toshiba on NT4.

Just to warn people out there: Afaik W2000 replaces the OSLoader (NTLDR) from NT4 and therefore some errors occur.

Still it was a good idea to install 2000 on my Toshiba Notebook since all devices including a Xircom RealPort card where detected during installation.
The IrDA port, too, which is quite different than that from other brands *plus* the complete Power Management with all the suspend/shutdown options I have in the Notebooks Bios - I'm impressed!
I didn't have to install a single driver from anywhere, all I need is the Windows installation CD...
cu,
-Tom

[This message has been edited by Thomas P (edited 01-20-2001).]