formatting c drive?

Question

i am trying to format c: through cmd prompt after i have entered the drive label and continued it says "format cannot run because the volume is in use by another process" i then close everything on my computer and it asks if it can do it too,i say yes, and then it says it cant lock the drive. I have tried the my computer way to try too, it says the same. I use a second hand laptop and dont have a windows or a recovery disk. What should i do?

Answer 1

if ur windows has been installed in the c: drive then u can not format c: drive from windows command prompt.....unless u have a bootable windows setup cd.....
get a bootable windows cd then set ur bios (keep pressing del when system is being restarted)priority to cd rom and insert the bootable cd ,,,save bios settings and exit....
now u can format ur c: drive....
if ur windows not installed in c: drive then just right click the drive u want to format and click format

Answer 2

You obviously need to read a lot before you try this... especially with no recovery disk.

Some computers have the recovery software on another partition. If you are successful at formating C: this would be blown away like dust in the wind.

I would suggest Googling your PC make and model and throw in an extra key word or 2, like recovery, restore, partition and/or format.

Many times you can contact the manufacture and request a recovery disk. These are usually about $20 or so.

Answer 3

(a) The first think to know is that after formatting what can you do with a computer if you really do not have any operating system (OS). You may start using LINUX which is available free of cost. You may try Open SuSE of Novell available free of cost. Then insert CD or DVD of OS and start installing the system which will eventuall format the disk.

(b) If you have floppy disk then make a bootable floppy by formatting the floppy in bootable mode and then copying "format" program to floppy. Now restart machine by booting from floppy.

(c) If you don't have floppy and have windows in machine then press F8 while booting and you will land up in a menu in which select dos mode so that you boot in dos mode. The try to use format command which should be able to format your C drive.

Cheers

Answer 4

If you format you drive C none of your hardware will work because all drivers all installed in there. You will need a bootable windows XP CD. This will install the operating system again and your drive C will be empty except for the usual stuff. You might want to get your service providers or your local computer guys opinion

Answer 5

Why do u want to format C: ? Assuming that you have prob with operating system (not working properly or hanging frequently etc), then better option would be to re-install OS.

In case you are OK with risk of loosing all data & ofcourse operating system on c:\, pop your
HDD out and put it in another computer running same OS as slave drive. After rebooting, you should get access to ur C:\ as some other drive and you may format the same there.

Answer 6

You can not format drive C by using command prompt from a system installed on drive C,,, mostly you had one system on drive C,,, so you can not format it using the same operating system on it,,, either you format using another operating system on drive D,,,or use CD or floppy disk

Answer 7

Well I don't think you can do it with just one hard drive. You can't format your main C drive, because obviously you are using it every time you turn on the computer, even in command prompt.

Answer 8

http://freepctech.com/pc/001/002.shtml

Answer 9

Try http://www.bootdisk.com/

Download the disk you need from here

Answer 10

http://www.techtutorials.net/