CompuServe Messages

It seems like your partition table and boot sectors are gone. The partition table defines what type of file system is installed on a particular partition. That's why you get FDISK telling you that's not a DOS disk. The boot sector defines what type of hard disk you have (how many sectors per cylinder, sector sizes, root directory size, etc.) Mirror (or image) won't do you much good by now. It saves the state of the FAT (which I can't tell if it's bad or not). You need to first rebuild the partition record. It has to be done by hand using some disk editor. You will then need a new boot record. If you installed NT, it made a copy of it for you. You should have a file in your root directory called BOOTSECT.DOS which you would just copy to sector 0. You can use Norton stuff for all this making sure you only copy a single sector ("from" and "to" must be the same sector number). If that's all that got screwed, you should be up and running. If the FAT is also ruined, then use the FAT image to restore it. If the damage went beyond the FAT (root directory for instance), then you will need to put the puzzle together by hand a piece at a time. Note that running FDISK, deleting the partitions, remaking a new DOS partition and reformatting the disk will also fix the disk but it obviously also deletes everything.