Try this winpe2 diskpart script:

select disk 0
clean
create partition primary size=20000
active
assign letter C:
format fs=ntfs label="SYSTEM" quick
create partition primary
assign letter D:
format fs=ntfs label="DATA" quick
exit

I am on it, thanks for you help.

Question, are there any negatives to using the 'quick' option on a brand

new server ? Versus normal format?

CHEERS!

I will keep the format within the diskpart script, thanks for that.

Without the 'quick' it is dead slow as well though.

Any idea why it is so slow, and what are the cons to using the 'quick' format option.

These are brand new servers, that have never had an OS loaded before.

Thanks.

I have built hundreds of new servers with the "quick" option ... no issues at all

However, I did use the format command from PE ... not the diskpart option.

Both ways of formatting (diskpart and format) are dog slow in PE2.0.

Even when booting to a machine that I use PE1.0 to build now.

PE1.0 is very quick, same machine PE2.0 is dog slow.

I will leave it as is with the 'quick' option.

Thanks for your help.

Just a thought ... I use HP SCSI drivers integrated into PE

Could it be you have a poor performing HD driver?

I'm using PE2.0 and trying to build a 2k3 server and have this issue.

So creating the logical and extended partitions as fat32 first works?

How do I tell the 2k3 setup to convert both to NTFS?

Please advise...

Or is there a better solution?

IBM x225.

In your answer file, put the following line in:

[unattended]

FileSystem=ConvertNTFS

Question, are there any negatives to using the 'quick' option on a brand

new server ? Versus normal format?

This is a little late.. but since it seems to be asked a couple times in this thread, and I didn't see an answer..

The only Negative is that it doesn't do a full format, it only formats the MBR/leading tracks.

What this would mean, is if you have a bad HDD, you may not notice it right away.

At least with my business the failure of a new HDD is so rare that this is a non issue.