Symptoms:
During boot process you press F12 to access DELL Diagnostics. You receive a message "DELL utility partition can’t be found"
Cause:
This can happen if DELL’s hidden OEM partition has somehow become corrupt or is deleted or unavailable. For example if you replaced your HDD. Or if you reinstalled an OS, deleteing all partitions on the HDD.
Resolution:
You will need the the original DELL Drivers and Diagnostics CD shipped with your hardware system.
The "Drivers and Utilities" CD is bootable, so boot from the CD and exit to the DOS prompt.
Run the utility with the command: x:\upc32\uptools\mkup #### , where "x" is the drive letter assigned to the CD drive and "####" is the appropriate version number of the Dell Diagnostics utility.
Note this utility requires a Diagnostics version number, and it will look for that version in the \diags folder on the CD.
Warning: This utility will destroy all pre-existing data on the hard disk, including the Windows partition! This utility should only be used on a new hard disk, or a hard disk that you are willing to wipe and start over with a completely new installation.
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