Reinstalling Windows

[bigMCben 0]

For some reason, everytime someone says that their computer isn't working, my wife chirps up "that's ok, Keith'll fix it", so on Monday I was presented with two laptops. Now I try the usual things, but generally a clean install is usually the only way to fix them, as they are usually seriously infected with :crap: . I have a disc which will reinstall the correct version of Windows according to the licence code on the machine, and the first laptop I tried worked a treat (the longest part being the 63 updates I had to install), however the second one is being a :cense: , and gets past selecting the language and keyboard and then stops, so I want to format the drive and then try, but I can't work out how to without getting to the command prompt, so can anyone tell me if I can format the drive and if so, how?

[gadget 0]

If i rmember you shoudl be able to hit an administration console / get to a prompt. (F8 ?)

 

From there you should be able to do a format c: (which formats the drive).

 

 

David

 

EDIT: you might need a repair/recovery disc of sorts too - this should give you the option of dropping to a prompt..

Edited June 24, 2010 by gadget

[dh140770 0]

You should be able to boot it onto the CD rather booting onto the C drive. You might need to amend the boot order in the Bios to do this.

 

From here is should be pretty simple. Do a new install and you should see options to delete the existing partition, which will completely wipe the disk and start again.

 

TIP : if the disk is a decent size then partition it. then you can put data on the D: drive and Windows on the C:. This means if the machine needs to re-install again, you don't have to worry about the data on D: because you just delete the C: partition and re-install.

[bigMCben 0]

I maybe wasn't clear enough in my initial post. I had a disc which I put into the drive and I have changed the bios settings so that the cd/dvd drive is first in the boot orderm. The disc does indeed start up and a screen appears asking me to confirm the installation language, keyboard layout and then I click on "Install Now". On the first laptop it worked fine, Windows installed and it's now running perfectly. The problem is that the second laptop just has a spinning egg timer which was still there after 6 hours, so I'm assuming that if it's not going to work after 6 hours, it probably won't work at all. The problem I have is that as far as I know, Windows won't let you format a drive on which Windows is installed, but I'm assuming that this laptop is so seriously infected, the only way I can reinstall Windows is by formatting the drive before using the disc so, how do I format the C drive on a laptop?

[stardust 0]

Does the laptop have a floppy drive - you can boot up from a dos disk and command line format..

I am pretty sure you can download a utility (google it) which will let you create a boot CD (on another pc) which will enable you to boot to a command prompt - then format.

 

Another option which i do on a regular basis is use a drive caddy (from maplin around £40 thou) - take out the hard drive on the laptop stick it in the caddy - via usb onto a working machine and then via windows you can then format the other drive.

 

Another thing - What Windows CD are you using? If the hard drive is SATA then earlier versions on Windows discs (before Service pack 2) have trouble installing and usually crash or blue screen.

 

sorry message is scattered i have been drinking beer for a long time tonight

If you live anywhere near hertofrdshire i can lend you a drive caddy

[gadget 0]

See if you can get a hold of a copy of Windows with the service packs already "included" on it.

 

In theory you should be able to re-partition discs during installation, THere may be an "advanced option" to select during the intial install stages?

 

Should be able to delete partition, recreate or just choose "insdtall on free space" and should do the rest for you..

 

 

Edited June 24, 2010 by gadget

[durbanite 0]

On my lappie i click on start,click on the option of explore,right click c drive(hdd) mine gives the option of formatting. Hope this helps.

[D.X 0]

You should be able to format the drive long before you select the keyboard and language settings.

Boot from CD and after it has loaded all the things it needs to install the OS you should be here. You need to delete the current partition. Create a new partition then format it to NTFS.

 

Then you can load the OS on to it.

 

Then wonder why it doesn't work as the serial number is for another machine (if it's a real copy).

 

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/46/124152337_d75f22de5c_o.jpg

 

http://www.microsoft.com/library/media/1033/windowsxp/images/using/setup/winxp/xp-setup-4-format.jpg