How do I reformat my hard drive to re-partition and re-install XP?

Question

Currently the HD has 2 partitians. The first is probably 90% of the HD and the second is large enough to install XP with a bit left to spare. To be honest, Im uncertain how I got 2 partitians to begin with. This puter has worked hard for a couple years and has too many issues to resolve. I believe my best approach would be to COMPLETELY reformat the hard drive ( I dont want to restore it to an earlier point etc--I want the HD wiped clean for a fresh start) and then reinstall a fresh copy of XP. I cant seem to figure out how to reformat the hard drive.


Can anyone tell me a reasonably simple way to reformat it?

I should have added that using the standard solutions suggested of following the installation instructions and through such deleting the single partitian were tried and the message received was that I could not delete the partitian. This is why I felt reformatting the entire hard drive would be the best solution.

I also want to eliminate any virus/spyware and other issues prior to installing an OS, which is again why I feel reformatting the HD is the way to go rather than re-installing/repairing anything.

Shouldn't I be able to get to a DOS prompt and reformat it from there?

Answer 1

okay, if you're using a seagate hdd, u can point your browser to: http://www.seagate.com/support/disc/drivers/discwiz.html and download the software called DiscWizard Starter Edition where it will let you choose how you want your drive to be set up, it'll let you choose if you want your drive to be formatted as NTFS, FAT32 or something else, plus you can freely choose how much space you would put in a certain partition its really easy to use and its a risk-free, i guarantee you this is the best choice!

you just boot from the cd-rom and everything after dat will be a wizard and you wont have to worry about all the commands and stuff...

Answer 2

If you don't like the 2 partition solution, get Partition Magic and Merge them. After that it's as simple as placing your XP disc into your CD ROM and accessing your BIOS when your computer is booting (usually F1 or Delete or F2) In boot options, select CD drive as the first boot item and reinstall the whole thing from there. If you have XP on recovery disks, like that come with Compaq and some Dells for example. Put the first disc in the drive and follow the above directions. That will wipe out your whole HD and all information on it and give you a clean install of XP.

Answer 3

Well, first make sure you dont have any needed files on the computer. then insert the windows xp installation cd into the drive and restart the computer. Once it restarts it should display a note at the top that says "Press any key to boot from cd-rom" press any key on the key board, and wait. it will load files etc. it will ask you to press f8, do that and the next screen it should display the current partitions that you have. using the arrow keys on the computer, go to each partition and hit delete. Just follow the instructions that it gives.

It will ask you to create a new partition. it will have a little box at the top where you can set the size of the partition in MegaBytes. Set the size of the partition to the maximum allowable size, then proceed with the insallation of xp, by formatting the newly created partition with NTFS file system.

Answer 4

If you used win 98 startup disk and fdisk you will now have a dos partition, xp dose not work in a dos partition.after changing partition you have to format the drive ,you now have nothing on youre drive, solution- load win 98-then install xp, you can install as a seperate system which means you will have 2 operating systems which you can use either one,what install on one system you can not access from the other but this should fix the problem

Answer 5

Put your XP CD in the drive and boot to the CD.

Complete instructions, including how to delete the partitions, can be found here:

XP Clean Install:
http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/cleanxpinstall.html

Answer 6

using Windows CD , you can do it..

First boot from Windows CD,it will ask for the partion to install.

you have only two partions,

select one of the partiions, and delete the partition.

and select another partition, and delete it again.

Now ur HDD is in Unformatted.

Now you can able to partion with that windows screen.

and you can partition , and able to install a fresh copy of Windows XP

Answer 7

the easiest way to reformat the hard drive is to insert the windows xp boot disc into the cd-rom. then you reboot your system, and when it prompts you, hit f1 or whatever key your bios requires for you to get into it. then change the boot disk from the C: drive (hard drive) to D: drive (cd-rom), or whichever letter is assigned to the cd-rom you're using.

then when the computer restarts, it will read off the windows xp cd instead of the hard drive. by doing so, it should ask you if you want to install xp. follow the prompts, as it will ask you to reformat the hard drive and repartition it.

Answer 8

boot off the XP cd and when asked what partition to install on delete the two original and create a new one taking up the whole disk

Answer 9

if you insert your XP disk and reboot your computer it should boot the disk and give you options to repair/install xp

note: if it does not boot from disk then reboot and go into bios and change the boot order to where your cd drive is first.

go the install/reinstall route and when it asked about formating you should beable to choose full reformat and select all partions and not just C.

Answer 10

I would suggest to backup your important files first, then, insert your bootable OS first choose to boot to command prompt, at dos prompt do an fdisk - this will partition or delete partition on your hd. then reboot and proceed with format and install OS.