DOWNGRADING from REPLAYTV Hard Drive back to PC Hard Drive

[edgermannn]

I'm new.....so please don't darts.

I recently upgraded a 120GB HD using a the REPLAYTV patch so that I could upgrade the REPLAYTV unit that I have.

When I went to turn it on however, it turns out that the unit apparently had been hit by lightning and is now useless.

So I have a 120GB hard drive with a REPLAYTV image on it that i now want to use in my PC.

How can I reverse the process so that it becomes a regular hard drive again?? I have used PARTITION software to restore, but said software does not like this hard drive at all.

I have deleted the partition, formatted, etc. to no avail. There's plenty of advice on how to create a REPLAYTV hard drive, but nothing on how to restore the hard drive back to one you can use in a regular PC.

Anyone got anything??

thanks

[nded]

Run the manufacturers diagnostics on the hard drive. If it passes the diagnostics, all you need to do is a "Low Level Format". Then Windows (and just about any other OS) should be able to work with the drive.

[baeder]

If you don't have one (or it doesn't work), look at something like the UBCD (google it)...it is a collection of dos based tools on a bootable CD. They have a lot of the tools (like the low level disk utils), and other things to really wipe out the early tracks that are used for the partitiion tables, MBR's etc.

[SpaceCadet]

If you're running Windows XP, see this (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/printthread.php?t=757164&p=8993293) post on using disk management.

[Timhr950]

You will need to use a low level format process. These are normally available on the website of the drive manufacturer. Look for diagnostic or management tools. Western Digital had a nice set of tools and in order to accomplish this type of format, choose "write 0's" as the option. You can then repartition it as a PC drice and perform a normal high level format.