Formatting hard drive

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Guest

Well, I thought this was basic, but evidently it is a bit
harder than I thought...

I am wanting to format my hard drive. Yep, completely
get rid of it all. Too many bugs, errors... all that
good stuff.

So, I've attempted simply formating from windows
explorer. I didn't expect that to work...

Next we attempted to simply get a command prompt, my
goodness, who would have thought the day would come that
you can't even get a command prompt.

We pulled out the Win98 and WinXP discs thinking they
might help. Nothing there

Installed and ran recovery console from the Win XP CD.
Finally, a command prompt!!!!!! Well, I typed in the
famous format c: and it asked me if I wanted to
proceed... said "yes"... and.... NOTHING!!!!

It appears I am doing something wrong! So, if anyone can
tell me how to simply get rid of all the information on
my pc and start over, please let me know... I miss the
good ol' days of DOS :)
 
Hi,

when you are ready to reinstall your Windows XP (after you backed up all
your data like, e-mails, favorites, documents and any private keys used for
EFS) insert Windows XP installation CD and boot from it. Soon you will have
option to delete current partitions, create new ones and format them...

Mike
 
In (e-mail address removed)
Well, I thought this was basic, but evidently it is a bit
harder than I thought...

I am wanting to format my hard drive. Yep, completely
get rid of it all. Too many bugs, errors... all that
good stuff.

So, I've attempted simply formating from windows
explorer. I didn't expect that to work...
Click to expand...


Just boot from the Windows XP CD and follow the prompts for a
clean installation. It will do the reformat for you.

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

However why do you want to do this? In my view, it's almost
always a mistake. With a modicum of care, it should never be
necessary to reinstall Windows (XP or any other version). I've
run Windows 3.0, 3.1, WFWG 3.11, Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows
2000, and Windows XP, each for the period of time before the next
version came out, and each on two machines here. I never
reinstalled any of them, and I have never had anything more than
an occasional minor problem.

It's my belief that this mistaken notion stems from the technical
support people at many of the larger OEMs. Their solution to
almost any problem they don't quickly know the answer to is
"reformat and reinstall." That's the perfect solution for them.
It gets you off the phone quickly, it almost always works, and it
doesn't require them to do any real troubleshooting (a skill that
most of them obviously don't possess in any great degree).

But it leaves you with all the work and all the problems. You
have to restore all your data backups, you have to reinstall all
your programs, you have to reinstall all the Windows and
application updates,you have to locate and install all the needed
drivers for your system, you have to recustomize Windows and all
your apps to work the way you're comfortable with.

Besides all those things being time-consuming and troublesome,
you may have trouble with some of them: can you find all your
application CDs? Can you find all the needed installation codes?
Do you have data backups to restore? Do you even remember all the
customizations and tweaks you may have installed to make
everything work the way you like?

Occasionally there are problems that are so difficult to solve
that Windows should be reinstalled cleanly. But they are few and
far between; reinstallation should not be a substitute for
troubleshooting; it should be a last resort, to be done only
after all other attempts at troubleshooting by a qualified person
have failed.

If you have problems, post them here, it's likely that someone
can help you and a reinstallation won't be required.
 
Well, I thought this was basic, but evidently it is a bit
harder than I thought...

I am wanting to format my hard drive. Yep, completely
get rid of it all. Too many bugs, errors... all that
good stuff.

So, I've attempted simply formating from windows
explorer. I didn't expect that to work...

Next we attempted to simply get a command prompt, my
goodness, who would have thought the day would come that
you can't even get a command prompt.

We pulled out the Win98 and WinXP discs thinking they
might help. Nothing there

Installed and ran recovery console from the Win XP CD.
Finally, a command prompt!!!!!! Well, I typed in the
famous format c: and it asked me if I wanted to
proceed... said "yes"... and.... NOTHING!!!!

It appears I am doing something wrong! So, if anyone can
tell me how to simply get rid of all the information on
my pc and start over, please let me know... I miss the
good ol' days of DOS :)
Click to expand...
Try this
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;316941&Product=winxpink
 
Greetings --

After you've backed up any data you wish to preserve, simply boot
from the WinXP installation CD. You'll be offered the opportunity to
delete, create, and format partitions as part of the installation
process. (You may need to re-arrange the order of boot devices in the
PC's BIOS to boot from the CD.)

HOW TO Install Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=KB;en-us;316941

http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/cleanxpinstall.html

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


Bruce Chambers
--
Help us help you:



You can have peace. Or you can have freedom. Don't ever count on
having both at once. - RAH
 
You cannot reformat a system drive from a system drive. Never could, even
back in the old DOS days. Think about it. Instead, you will need to bootup
from a bootable disk such as the XP CD, then do your reformat/reinstall from
there.
 
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