Well when I created the partition, the option that I chose was "create logical DOS partition" and that was the correct choice.

Still, I can't seem to get into the C drive.

C: is bootable, so it needs to be a primary partition. Logical partitions are just a way of dividing a single primary partition into several smaller partitions.

Okay, here's the current problem.

I managed to get the C: Drive to work, and I can access it, but it's buggy. Whenever I try to put something there, or even do a /dir to find out what's there, it tells me that some sort of like "insecure media type accessing. Abort retry fail."

So I figured "Hey, I got the C: Drive working, why not install windows? Well, I tried. I put the primary dos partition there, used my emergency boot disk, and tried instaling Windows 95. It performs the routine system check, and then tells me "Windows needs 7000000 bytes to install"

That's 7 megabytes, right? Well, it has to be, if I did the math right.

Now, when I created the partition, I set it so that it would take up 100% (Which is about 1 gig and a few megs). Does this mean that there's no room for anything on my C: drive?

Well, I tested that. I created a partition that left about 10 Mb free so that it would have space to install. No dice, it still says it needs 7mb.

This time, I set the partition to take up 10 mb (you'll notice I'm giving windows some lee-way here.)

Still no dice, it keeps telling me it needs 7 mb of space.

So then I tried not even making a partition. It gave me a different error this time. It told me it couldn't detect whether my HD was NTFS or FAT (something like that, I don't remember the abbreviations)

Any ideas? I'm all out.

What partition type did you use? I don't think FAT16 or FAT12 can handle 1 gig sizes, and it's probably throwing everything off. You need FAT32 for that, and I don't know if any versions of DOS before 7 support it.

And unpartitioned space isn't recognized as any kind of drive, anywhere, at all. It must be partitioned to be used.

Do you still want to use your parents' computer? I'd avoid installing a second OS there. You'd probably leave quite visible tracks. Go for a boot CD with some sort of Linux in combination with a USB stick or so to store data. But that might get difficult on a system with only 16 megs. In that case I'd suggest to just get a very cheap used old computer.

Unless they'd forbid you to get one of your own. In that case it would really be time to have a calm and serious talk with them. Maybe you could get a teacher or some other adult person they respect to speak to them? Learning to exploit the full powers of a computer is pretty valuable and should come handy in your futur life.

So is it your own or your parents'?

Then go on.

Did you format it? If it doesn't get formatted you will have 0mb space to use.
And not a quick format either. You have to do a full format.
Every time you set the partitoin different, the format is lost and needs to be done all over again.

DOS (and Windows) FDISK sucks (as you found out). Either get a copy of Partitition Magic, or use Linux fdisk. You should be able to run it from a livecd.

No, it only works in Linux. But it'll work from a Linux bootfloppy or liveCD.

I was going to suggest that boot floppy, but I'd lost the link (I still have a bootfloppy though).

If I remember correctly, FAT supports up to 2gb, right? So you hard drive should be just fine in DOS.

FAT32 does. I dunno about FAT12 or FAT16.