I installed xp on an older laptop and it has taken up to much room .. it only
has 4 gigs of memory.
What you REALLY mean by "memory" is actually called "free space" on
your HD, not "memory". "Memory" refers to the dynamic RAM on your
motherboard, not HD space.
I want to reformat ( is that the best step?) and then
install 98 or even 95 so I have a little more open space. I can not find on
Xp where to re format. I go to the c prompt and it will not let me do Format
C: because other thins are open etc etc.
XP does not use the MS-DOS "fdisk/format" pair anymore to prepare the
HD for installation. Instead, it contains code within the Setup
program itself to prepare the HD for XP installation.
Are there certain things I should
shut down before the computer will alow me to do it?
I can not see where to start in safe mode if that would maybe help me do
what I need??
Thanks for any help
To return to Windows 98, you COULD just uninstall it from Add/Remove
programs in the XP Control Panel, IF you did an "Upgrade" install of
XP over 98, AND told the XP installer to back up the Windows 98 files
at the time you upgraded to XP. You cannot do this with Windows 95,
since the XP Retail install discs cannot upgrade an installation of
Windows 95 which is residing on your HD.
So if you want Windows 95 installed, you will have to install it
"clean", after deleting all partitions and recreating and reformatting
them as FAT volumes. If this is the case, the largest partition you
will be able to create will be only 2 gig. This is large enough for
Windows 95 and programs which will run on 95.
If your System Partition is an NTFS volume (XP's native file system),
and you want to return to either w98 or w95 (or any other version of
Windows or MS-DOS installed on a FAT volume), you will be required to
do a CLEAN installation of that OS, however it is done.
As far as not being able to boot using the Windows 98 startup floppy,
this may be caused by having your floppy either turned off in the
BIOS, or having the floppy not being at the top of the chain of boot
devices in the BIOS. Check the BIOS settings for the Boot order, and
make sure the floppy is at the top of the list, and also make sure
that the floppy is enabled in the BIOS.
Or perhaps it is a faulty startup floppy. Floppies do go "bad" after
sitting around for a few years in the dust and electrical signals
found around many computer stations.
You might go to this site and download a Windows 98 or Windows 95
startup floppy image, and burn it to a NEW, unused floppy disk.
Personally, with HD prices being so low, I see no reason why you don't
just purchase a newer, larger HD. You can get a 40gig HD for as
little as $59 in some places. This would give XP more than enough
storage space to work in.
Donald L McDaniel
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