I am helping my girl friend's parents to fix their computer. It is running really really slow with all the clutter that is taking up space on their hard drive. I'm not sure what model dell they own. I believe they had purchased it back in 2001. I was able to locate the back up disks. How do I erase the hard drive completely and reinstall windows and everything else so as to make the computer almost brand new, much like the day they took it out of the box?
2006-08-23 15:58:29 · 10 answers · asked by Anonymous in Computers & Internet ➔ Other - Computers
Stick in the restore/recovery disk (with the OS on it - usually it's black or red) and reboot the computer. Then follow the directions and restore to original factory settings. Don't forget to back up their important files.
2006-08-23 16:00:00 · answer #1 · answered by Dude 3 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Insert the restore CD that was shipped with this PC into the CD drive and reboot. You might see a message "Press any key to boot from CD". Press the key. The idea is to boot from the CD and choose RESTORE. You will be told that you will lose all data on the hard disk. If you've backed up everything then proceed.
2006-08-23 16:01:34 · answer #2 · answered by Cambion Chadeauwaulker 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
If it's a dell it should have come with the Operating system CD. If you have it, then just put the CD in and reboot the machine. It should start booting from the CD. If it does, then just follow the instructions. They are usually pretty good. If you don't have those CD's then you need a full version of XP home or pro, format and reintall the Operating system.
2006-08-23 16:02:19 · answer #3 · answered by napmia 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Dell provided a restore CD. If you backed up the important documents, I would put the restore CD in the CD drive, reboot, boot into the CD, and follow the on-screen instructions.
2006-08-23 16:04:05 · answer #4 · answered by EDDie 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
I just had to do this on my Dell.
Put the Reinstall Windows CD in, restart the computer, press F12 when the Dell logo appears. Press arrow keys to select CD-rom, press enter. When Press any key to boot from CD appears, press any key
You'll have to reinstall everything after that.
2006-08-23 16:03:21 · answer #5 · answered by ~-~-~-~-~ 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Format c:/
Remember, everything will be gone, get all off their data and make sure they have the software and the keys so that they can get it all installed and up and running. You know, like MS Word.
If you have done the cleaning, have you tried running a defrag. That should help with the performance.
2006-08-23 16:05:33 · answer #6 · answered by starting over 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
use the format C: command from a floppy disk. or boot from the cd and and select to format and install
2006-08-23 16:03:17 · answer #7 · answered by sllyjo 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Before you reformatt goto www.ewido.net and run the free version to remove spyware/trojans etc.
Here are some other free ones.
Spybots search and Destroy http://www.download.com/3000-8022-10122137.html?tag=pao
adaware se> http://www.download.com/Ad-Aware-SE-Personal-Edition/3000-8022_4-10399602.html?tag=lst-0-1
http://www.webroot.com/land/freescan.php
a-squared Free> http://www.emsisoft.com/en/software/free/
http://housecall.antivirus.com/housecall/start_frame.asp
http://housecall65.trendmicro.com/
X -Cleaner Micro Edition scan http://www.spywareguide.com/onlinescan.php
http://www.kaspersky.com/virusscanner
http://www.windowsecurity.com/trojanscan/
http://www.bitdefender.com/scan8/ie.html
http://www.pandasoftware.com/products/activescan/com/activescan_principal.htm
http://www3.ca.com/securityadvisor/virusinfo/scan.aspx
http://www.javacoolsoftware.com/spywareblaster.html
Spywareguard too.
http://www.javacoolsoftware.com/spywareguard.html
http://www.ewido.net/en/onlinescan/
2006-08-23 16:02:33 · answer #8 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
tell them not to get a dell cuz once u download like 3 programs... the dell becomes slow. so... i use hp. tell them to get hp
2006-08-23 16:03:01 · answer #9 · answered by dj_j65 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
find the restore cd. and follow the prompts.
2006-08-23 16:00:31 · answer #10 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋