How do you reformat a harddrive and reinstall windows?

Question

My father got an older computer but it is full of junk. I need to clean it and install windows so as to keep it simple for him. He is just learning how to get on a computer. I tried to reinstall windows and now it gives error messages relating to the registery every five mins. or so. Please can someone tell me how. I am computer literate, but never had to delve this deep into the operating system.

Answer 1

My Computer> C Drive > Format> Type? F32 Are you sure? y/n (Y) Go

Just make your setup is ready to boot from your CD drive first. When it reboots make sure the Windows CD is in the drive and then just wait a few minutes to a few hours.

Answer 2

You never said what version of Windows you are trying to install. If it is an older computer and you are trying to install windows xp, chances are, you're computer won't be able to push it. That is why you are getting the error messages from your registery. Try something like Windows 98 or Windows ME. Don't even think about trying Windows Vista. I hope this helped.

Answer 3

Hi,
This is easy just put your Windows disk into your CD drive then Switch your P.C Off, wait a minute, Switch it back On and when it boots up it should boot from the disk (if your BIOS is set correctly, easy to change) then select install, and remember to reformat and then install onto the same Partition. Hope this helps.

Answer 4

Boot to the Windows Installation CD. It will give you an option to reformat the hard drive before installing Windows.

Answer 5

pop in a windows cd, restart computer, enable boot from cd in bios.
windows install will start loading, a screen will appear with partitions and just delete all the partitions and make a new one and it will ask if you want to format. then the rest of the install is pretty self explanatory.

Answer 6

whilst XP plenty and you get to the deploy window you will desire to concentration on and hit "L" to delete each and each partition and then create a clean one. bypass with the dimensions suggestion and format the created partition and then deploy XP. you will desire to purely have one partition once you're finished. if your no longer basic force is SATA you will would desire to deploy the RAID drivers early contained in the XP setting up whilst it asks for third occasion drivers or your workstation won't paintings. i desire you will hit upon XP drivers for all your hardware once you're carried out.

Answer 7

Listen to MARKMONO and SLIDER.... remember if you are trying to install XP on a very old machine, it will not be able to handle it.... try Windows 98se this should be stable...

Answer 8

if you want to reinsall xp boot your computer from the xp cd during setup you will be offerd the opportunity to format your drive

Answer 9

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