Formatting a toshiba satellite

I am trying to Format a Toshiba satellite laptop, it is 12 months old and has Windows 8.1 on it.

when I try to format, it keeps telling me that a driver partition is missing and if I just try to refresh the laptop it tells me that a partition is locked 

any help Please

Have you tried using the recovery section of the drive ?

At boot I believe you start tapping the F8 key (this can vary dependent on system\maker) once a second until you get a screen with options come up, then within those options you should see the option to return it to the factory settings, needless to say this will wipe all info on the drive, so back up anything you need if that's possible first, if need be you can run Slacko to access the drive to get what you need saved, then just run the recovery to get it working properly again, hope this helps.

That is the problem I am having. It is the "ZERO" key on this laptop, but when I get to the return to factory setting part it tries for a couple of seconds and then comes up with the missing and locked bit

can I unlock a partition some how 

Does it happen to say any more about it being locked ?

I ask as I have come across security locked drives on a few drives over time, they are now paper weights and door stops, given the age of the system have you gone back to the place you bought it from, or if needed Toshiba directly ?

I'm hoping they will sort it out under warranty, it would be your best result, so see what they are willing to do for you, then let us know and we can go from there if needed.

When I try to format it says

"Unable to reset your PC, The required drive partition is missing"

And when I try to Refresh the drive after going to the recovery section then it says

""The drive where Windows is installed is locked, unlock the drive and try again"

​I have gone to the Toshiba UK web site but it is down till tomorrow 

I think it may be worth checking out the drive, do you know the make\model of the hard drive ?

Assuming you can find it go direct to the makers site, and download their utility for checking the drive, use that to test the drive, that with luck tell us if the drive is good, or on the way out.

Another thought, you didn't drop it did you ?

And what have you used to get this done, e.g. have you used any 3rd party tools to wipe the drive have you ?

Should this be the case you may have damaged the recovery partition, which means you will need some recovery media (e.g. a windows disk, or the recovery disk you are prompted to make when you first get it), do you have anything like that around ?

I will try to find the make\model of the hard drive

I have used any 3rd party tools, only the ones built in

 

"Unable to reset your PC, The required drive partition is missing"

have you installed a linux operating system on that machine before or done a clean install of the current operating system using a cd/dvd instead of the built in program, deleted a data partition or even just done an os upgrade using a cd/dvd?

usually i've found the cause of not being able to do a factory reset is because of one of those things,

a corrupt mbr,

deleted restore partition,

deleted data partition.

you really need to use something to show the partition table of the hard drive and then share the results here so we can advise what to do next, if the recovery partition is still there then simply making that the boot partition should work to do a factory restore and get everything working as normal, if that doesn't work then we might need to create a data partition first and then try booting the recovery partition again but we do need to see exactly what the partition table is on the hard drive.

sorry having a brain dead moment and can't think what you should use to inspect the partition table, think it's fdisk in a linux operating system or using a linux live cd but not even sure about that at the minute, so can't offer you any real detailed info on next steps but hope this generalization helps you.

That should read "I have NOT used any 3rd party tools, only the ones built in"

Have you been able to find out the drive details yet ?

There are 2 ways to try, first is to enter the bios at boot, normally accessed by tapping the Del (delete) key as you boot, within there with luck you will find the details against the drive, even if they don't make sense, as they are most likely going to be letters and numbers, note that down then exit without saving, and you won't have changed anything.

The other way requires the flap on the back of the system removed, odd's on there will be 2 or 3 panels, look to the one that is most like the size\shape of a hard drive, undo the screws and gently prise the cover out, it's quite possible it snaps in so removing it will make it "pop" as each bit comes free, watch out if the screws are not completely out, as they could ping off, and with their size they can be impossible to see\find unless you get lucky, but needless to say if there is ANY kind of warranty on this do NOT do this, as it would probably invalidate any cover, but then if it does have cover, that is you best way to go.

this may help :- http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_8-system/the-drive-where-windows-is-installed-is-locked/9fe0c708-1d03-4cab-8523-e80c9b17e124

 

This issue might occur if the drive communication mode is set as AHCI on the Windows 8 computer whereas the drive is connected in IDE mode.

 

or

x:\>chkdsk /f /v /r /b /offlinescanandfix c:

info in link.

again i would like to stress for best advice, we really do need to see the drive partition table, then we will know exactly what partitions are on the drive, what file system is on each partition and from there we should be able to figure out  how to fix the problem, which i believe may be corrupted windows/boot files.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyBrjDpsXGc

Thank you all for your help.

I have sorted it out, I used the setting and then the "Change PC settings" in windows 8

Mandal 1212,

Can you please write for us What setting you changed. I also Having same problem.

Thanks,