format install ?

[JG]

Hello I've been running WinXPhome for sometime on an Emachne that
came loaded with it. But started having problems with Quicken and then
ran Regcure and it trashed my machine where various software won't run.
So I decided to reinstall XP from an OEM disk I bought
(XP HOME legal CD)
However My Emachine won't boot "first" from the CD, and if
I try to format my hard drive it baulks saying volume is being
used by another process.
I tried running setup from the CD but it complains about a
version of windows already running and there could be problems
installing two versions of the OS to the hard drive.
My God I just want to format the damn hard drive and install
a legal WinXP home what in the heck do I have to do to accomplish
this?

 

[Poprivet]

Hello I've been running WinXPhome for sometime on an Emachne that
came loaded with it. But started having problems with Quicken and then
ran Regcure and it trashed my machine where various software won't
run. So I decided to reinstall XP from an OEM disk I bought
(XP HOME legal CD)
However My Emachine won't boot "first" from the CD, and if
I try to format my hard drive it baulks saying volume is being
used by another process.
I tried running setup from the CD but it complains about a
version of windows already running and there could be problems
installing two versions of the OS to the hard drive.
My God I just want to format the damn hard drive and install
a legal WinXP home what in the heck do I have to do to accomplish
this?

I don't know the e-machine, but the option to boot from the CD drive is
controlled from within the CMOS BIOS; it might be called somethng else in
your e-machine; system settings, system BIOS, etc..
You press some key as the machine starts to boot, and the key is usually
spelled out on the screen for a very short time as the bootup starts. It
might be F2, ESC, and other keys that different machines use. Press that
when you see the message and when you the BIOS screen comes up, look among
the options for something like "boot order" or "boot sequence", "boot
Device", etc.. You need to tell it to boot from the CD AND to look for a
bootable CD FIRST, before it looks at the disk drive.
Then you should be able to boot from the CD.

HTH
Pop`

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

Hello I've been running WinXPhome for sometime on an Emachne that
came loaded with it. But started having problems with Quicken and then
ran Regcure and it trashed my machine where various software won't run.
So I decided to reinstall XP from an OEM disk I bought
(XP HOME legal CD)
However My Emachine won't boot "first" from the CD, and if

You have to set it to do that in the BIOS setup program.

I try to format my hard drive it baulks saying volume is being
used by another process.

You're trying to format form within Windows. the other process is
Windows. You can't do that.

I tried running setup from the CD but it complains about a
version of windows already running and there could be problems
installing two versions of the OS to the hard drive.
My God I just want to format the damn hard drive and install
a legal WinXP home what in the heck do I have to do to accomplish
this?

Just boot from the Windows XP CD (change the BIOS boot order if
necessary to accomplish this) and follow the prompts for a clean
installation (delete the existing partition by pressing "D" when
prompted, then create a new one).

You can find detailed instructions here:
http://michaelstevenstech.com/cleanxpinstall.html

or here
http://xphelpandsupport.mvps.org/how_do_i_install_windows_xp.htm

or here http://windowsxp.mvps.org/XPClean.htm

or here http://www.webtree.ca/windowsxp/clean_install.htm