How to safely delete WindowsXP?

[randwill]

I had a XP crash that I couldn't recover from. I bought a new hard drive and
loaded WindowsXP and all my programs onto it. I moved the hard drive that
was previously C drive (the one with the broken OS) to the slave position to
use as a storage drive. How do I safely remove all the WindowsXP operating
system from this drive to make more room on it? Can I simply put the
WINDOWS folder in the Recycle Bin and be done with it?

 

[WaIIy]

I had a XP crash that I couldn't recover from. I bought a new hard drive and
loaded WindowsXP and all my programs onto it. I moved the hard drive that
was previously C drive (the one with the broken OS) to the slave position to
use as a storage drive. How do I safely remove all the WindowsXP operating
system from this drive to make more room on it? Can I simply put the
WINDOWS folder in the Recycle Bin and be done with it?

You can format the drive or just delete the files you don't want.

Holding down the shift key when you delete will bypass the recycle bin
and they will be gone.

 

[Guest]

Wow, that's a radical solution for an OS crash.

But anyway, I would recommend you re-format the old hard drive - unless
there's still data on it that you want to save.
Of course you can just delete the Windows folder, but there's more junk
under Program Files and Documents and Settings that is left over from your
old installation.

 

[Guest]

Simply format it.

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

I had a XP crash that I couldn't recover from. I bought a new hard drive and
loaded WindowsXP and all my programs onto it. I moved the hard drive that
was previously C drive (the one with the broken OS) to the slave position to
use as a storage drive. How do I safely remove all the WindowsXP operating
system from this drive to make more room on it? Can I simply put the
WINDOWS folder in the Recycle Bin and be done with it?

Yes. Assuming that there is some data on the drive you want to keep.
you can delete everything else but that data.

 

[Lil' Dave]

Given what you've done so far, and the symptoms; run the hard drive
manufacturer's checking software on the hard drive with the problem. It may
map out any problematic areas as a result. If any partition still exists,
remove it with disk manager, and create a new one to take the entire space
of the hard drive.

--
Dave
Profound is we're here due to a chance arrangement
of chemicals in the ocean billions of years ago.
More profound is we made it to the top of the food
chain per our reasoning abilities.
Most profound is the denial of why we may
be on the way out.

 

[IntelAsus]

Another solution . Move all your data that you want to save to another disk
and then formate the old disk and then put the usefull data back again.
That's of course if you have space enought.

IntelAsus

 

[randwill]

Another solution . Move all your data that you want to save to another
disk and then formate the old disk and then put the usefull data back
again. That's of course if you have space enought.

IntelAsus

That's what I ended up doing.