Reformatting Hard Drive With Cds And The Product Key
Dec 19, 2009
I'm going to be reformatting my hard drive. However this time around I realized I might have a problem.
I originally purchased my pc with windows vista, but then when windows 7 came out I purchased it and immediately installed it on my computer. Bottom line, the factory image of my drive contains windows vista and my current operating system is windows 7.
So, If i go ahead and reformat my hard drive my system will revert back to windows vista (right?). I still have the windows 7 installation cds and the product key. So, can I just reformat and then just simply reinstall windows 7 with the cds and the product key? Or is it more complicated than that?
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Jun 15, 2012
So my PC was recently infected with viruses, and I was able to get rid of them with Malware bytes and Microsoft Security Essentials.I;m not sure if I completely got rid of the viruses so I want to just completely wipe my hard drive and get rid of it all. When I go to reformat my Hard Disk, Windows says I cannot because it's in use.I google'd around and some guides are saying that I'd be able to reformat and boot up through the Win. 7 installation disk; the problem is that I don't have a Win 7. installation disk.
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Mar 12, 2011
anybody knows how to reformatting the hard drive disc at the setup?
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Jan 15, 2013
I am about to reformat my hard drive, long story as to why, but I am starting from scratch. I know how to install windows, drivers etc. But one thing I am not sure about is configuring the RAID, as I wasn't the one who did it when we installed everything. I am asunming that when I reformat the RAID will need to be reconfigured? I have RAID 5 with three hard drives, each 500 GB. I have a program called Intel Rapid Storage Technology that "manages" the hard drives,but if I am correct I have to set up RAID before installing windows. How to configure the RAID the same way I currently have it? This is a homebuilt comp, i7 930 2.8 ghz, 6 GB RAM, Windows 7 Pro 64-bit, Gigabyte motherboard...
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Nov 22, 2009
I just bought a new Hard drive and I installed windows 7 onto it, but whenever I put in my product key, it says the key is not valid. Does this mean I have to buy a brand new Windows 7 or is there a way around this?
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Jun 17, 2012
I am upgrading my Hard Drive to an SSD and I was going to do a Clean install of Windows 7 but for some reason I can not find my Windows 7 CD including the case. I have the product key since it is in my computer but I just don't have the disk, What I should do.
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Nov 12, 2010
I recently purchased a Dell Xps 1340 laptop that came with windows 7 32 bit professional. After a few months, I needed to wipe the hard disk, and so I did. Before I did, I extracted my product key with a program that I downloaded off the internet. I got the following information:
Windows 7 Professional
Product Part No.: X15-37377
Installed from 'OEM' media.
Product ID: ******* match to CD Key data
CD Key: *********
Computer Name: ***-PC
Registered Owner: ***
Registered Organization:
Anyway, I had a RETAIL windows 7 professional disc, and I installed this onto my dell laptop. However, it keeps telling me that my product key is wrong when I try to activate. I have tried both 32bit and 64bit? is it because I'm using a RETAIL windows 7 disc? If I try a dell oem disc, will that work with my product key?
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Nov 3, 2011
You know, these previous days I haven't used my laptop because of some problems, I already posted my problem still waiting for the result and i'm really out of patience now.. So what's on my mind now is to reinstall the os or reformatting hard disk.. which is better can i choose reformatting the hard disk because it is faster than reinstalling windows? What will happen when i reformat the hard drive? will the system go back normal? i don't care now about my files since i have a backup what i want is to back my laptop in good state..
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Nov 30, 2012
When I reboot the laptop to install Windows XP, it goes well. But when it comes to the page where you can Select, Delete or Create a partition, the laptop's system drive is not showing. The page only shows the USB drive as my drive C, because it is my priority right? So now, I cannot reformat the laptop because the system drive of the laptop is not showing. What and where is the problem? Is it the bootable USB? or there is another way to make a downgrade? or the problem is my system drive?
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Jan 17, 2013
I am having issues with my computer and am planning on reformatting. I have a terabite hard drive which I moved everything to and a half terrabite hard drive which has Windows 7 and all that on it. If I reformat will it remove everything from all the hard drives or just the one I choose to install Windows 7 on?
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Mar 14, 2011
Reformatting HP mini doesn't have a disk drive
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Nov 14, 2012
I have a hard drive I want to backup to a 64gb flash drive and then restore it to another different hard drive than where it came from. I have windows 7 and office on my laptop and I want it on my desktop pc. There isn't close to 64gb of info on my laptop so it should be fine even though the hard drive says I have 160gb. It is all free space except for those programs.
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May 17, 2010
I had an old thread on Windows 7 running really unreliable on my system, and after speaking with a Sony support person today, I've found out that Sony does not support Windows 7 on my system. It's a bummer but, at any rate, I'm trying to put Windows XP back on the system.I've downloaded the Windows XP Professional with SP3 from MSDN student website.I have the ISO burned to a disc, and I boot the computer from CD drive.After the initial setup, it ask to start windows and press enter.I do so, and I says to select the drive I wish to reformat.There are four slots, all of which say "No drive found" Whenever you press ANY button, I get a BSOD.Any reason as to why it doesn't recognize any drives, or why I can't get any further into the process without it crashing?
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Oct 25, 2011
So, I have a i7 2600K system with a solid state disk as the boot drive, and an older (c2008) Samsung Spinpoint F3 500GB drive as the data drive for programs (that I deem as not worthy of the quick load times). The hard drive has given me some errors over time, and I bought a hard disk to replace it (a Hitachi 1TB). The issue I'm having is that the fact that Windows 7 puts a small (100MB) partition on the F3, and for some reason, even though I'm running Acronis 2012, it doesn't seem to be able to clone the F3 over to the Hitachi. I've also tried Drive XML, and for my 2 hour wait, I only managed to acquire a boot error. Thankfully, I've not done anything rash to destroy the data on the F3, but given the fact that I've seen corrupted files in Steam from that drive, I'm not will to trust it long term with my data. I really need to get the data onto that Hitachi, though... Anyone have any advice for upgrading the HDD in a SSD/HDD system? I don't really feel like it should be so hard, especially if I've bought Acronis True Image, but maybe they haven't designed their product to handle this scenario quite yet?
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Jun 16, 2011
I have a HP Touchsmart IQ500. Turning my computer PC on today, all I got was a blue HP invent screen with setup, boot menu, system recovery, and system diagnosis, and I could not get past it. I entered the BIOS and figured out that the hard drive was listed as "not installed." Pretty sure that is the main problem.I tried a system restore (with the Windows 7 install disc), but I guess the computer couldn't read the hard drive enough to enter safe mode (I tried restarting and F8ing several times). I put in an external hard drive, and the BIOS read it; however, windows does not allow you to partition an OS on a hard drive.
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Mar 30, 2012
I have an internal hard disk not in use ,and I would like to make it as external disk !I looked on the net and I found I should have the " encelsure " butt I think I wont find it here in my city .So is there another way ? like usb -esata cable
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Mar 4, 2010
Me and my brother built me a new computer from scratch (he did the building - i did the watching). I purchased an internal hard drive from Overclockers UK. It's a Samsung 1TB drive. I also have a 64 Solid-state drive in there as my primary hard drive that Windows was installed on and a couple of programs are installed on. My storage disk (the 1TB disk) is for all my music/films etc. Whenever I drag and drop a file into the Samsung hard-drive - it copies it rather than moves it instantly.When I had a laptop, I had 3 external hard drives and this is the way it copied files onto them.how I can get the internal drive to stop acting like an external drive?
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Dec 24, 2011
I have a virus infected sata hard drive with windows 7 on it. It has the win 7 anti virus 2012 on it, and it's a cybercriminal virus. I have lots of files I want to transfer to the new sata drive. I already have windows 7 installed on the new drive. How do I get the files from the bad drive to the new one?
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Jan 21, 2013
I have a USB Webcam 6.1.7601.17514 from Microsoft installed on a Fujitsu Laptop (Windows 7 ) and I want to copy and install it on another Fujitsu laptop (Windows 7).The other laptop the camera is not working and there is no webcam driver installed.
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Nov 16, 2009
I have Vista installed on my Hard Drive, 250 GB.
But i recently purchased a 2nd Hard Drive, 500 GB, and i want to install Windows 7 on it.
Is that possible, to have both separately?
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Sep 4, 2009
What is the difference between a Windows 7 Default Product Key and a Product Key?
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Oct 8, 2011
make a dualboot comp by adding windows XP to a new partition. I created the new partition with 20gb. (From the 500 of my actual harddrive)But before I actually installed on that, I got distracted with a second harddrive that my dad got(for no reason). It had a full copy of Windows XP backed up on it from another computer, so I figured I would just use that for the dualboot. I plugged it in (wired the same way as my old harddrive, but different data slot), restarted, checked the harddrive in explorer - all the data was there / reading correctly / etc, and I used 'easyBCD' to add the new harddrive to the boot list.(Which, of course, crashes if I try to start it. I just wanted to see what it would do). For a reason I can't remember, I unplugged the second harddrive for a bit, started the computer on accident (I don't know if anything loaded before I shut it off), and then when I plugged it back in.Windows 7 would not launch. It goes to a DOS-like window, except it's just a flashing _ and it never does anything even after a few minutes. XP didn't work still.. so I decided to reinstall XP (as I couldn't tell which harddrive was which on the list, I unplugged the main harddrive while installing onto the new).. and when I did this.. it formatted and installed fully... then restarted.. then restarted.. and restarted.. and just kept restarting, never showing any thing past the manufacturer logo/BIOS load-button-message-thing. So, I then try to use my 3-disk Windows7Recovery disk(burned myself with a program apparently included by the manufacturer.) It installed fully, appearing to work.. but when I launched it, it said "Invalid Partition Table" and wouldn't boot past that. When I insert my driver installer disk, it gives me a basic DOS window thing. dir A: shows the files in the disk. dir B: for some reason shows the same. C: says "Error reading from drive C: DOS area: general failure". All other letter:'s just say "invalid drive". (I'm doing this with both harddrives in.) I attempted connecting the harddrives to an old computer, but it gave an error for both. (It detected the harddrives, but said it had an error reading from it. Windows Explorer asked me to format it... {i'm willing to format one of the drives if anybody thinks it will help, but the old harddrive has data I'd prefer not to lose.} ) Looking on google, I saw several problems that all have similar problems (less overdescripptive than I am though) but none of the fixes suggested worked for me. Also - as I have two different with different errors, I only need to make one of them work.)Also - my other available computer has a CD burner / floppy drive if either are required. I also have several USB's. The computer can boot from USB's and CD's (tested), and I could easily take the floppy thingy and connect it to the computer.also - this computer is probably still under warranty unless unscrewing the hard drive voids it. .. does that count as modification of the computer?
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Sep 12, 2011
im having a trouble with my Lifebook.. i want to reformat or recover everything.. because its been a month that my SD READER can not recognize.
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Oct 1, 2011
I've been hit by viruses in the past months and I believe that ever since I got this computer - less than a year ago, there were problems with the security as I've had a difficult time updating Windows, and maybe that's the reason I got hit twice in less than one year, even though I used virus protection and firewall. So I figure, since I don't have this computer for very long, there isn't that much stored , so I might as well back up and store whatever is on the HD and reformat the system, start afresh. I did once reformat an old computer - it was Win XP, and that is all the experience I have had so far, so I'm wondering if anyone has any pointers for me before I start. In general I believe I only need to insert the OS disk and reboot, making sure it boots from disk, and then wait for prompts and choose to reformat.
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Oct 19, 2012
After having tons of issues with my PC, I finally got around to reformating and reinstalling XP for the first time since 2009. Around the same time I ordered a Windows 7 Pro Upgrade disc online, but went ahead and reinstalled XP to get me going while I waited for Windows 7 to arrive.As usual, XP was a PITA to reinstall. Had to get on the laptop to find an Intel ethernet driver for the mobo just to be able to get online, and then had to find drivers for other stuff after getting a whole list of yellow 's in the hardware listWell yesterday Windows 7 arrived, and I installed it last night, doing another format of the entire 250GB C drive and installing Windows 7 fresh. Everything went so smoothly, I was amazed. It picked up all the drivers it needed, and when everything was finished I ended up with only a single for the Intel Simple Communications Controller, which was remedied with another driver for the Intel mobo.
I've been using Windows 7 x64 at my office for 3 years now, but it has been some time since I've done a fresh install of it. Sooo much easier than XP in just about every way. *edit* I did install the x86 version since I'm still only running 3 GB RAM. In the near future I plan on upgrading the CPU and mobo and installing 16 GB RAM along with Windows 7 x64. Hope I don't have any issues being that this Windows is an upgrade version and there won't be any trace of XP when I do the hardware upgrades.
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Oct 31, 2009
I read about the fact that windows 7 doesn't reformat the harddrives and leaves all your old clutter on and just creates a new section of clutter.
I read I could pick to repartion if if restarted booting up from Windows 7 on the CD.. Which I did, but never saw any offer to repartion (which I would love to do because my drive on XP had to be spliced into 2 partiions because XP could not handle the size.. I would love to go to one partion.) But I know repartioning also reformats..
Anyway I guess I did a clean install (although I saw nothing that offered the clean install, but I know moving for XP to 7 needed that.)
It just forced me to put everythine into a windows.old folder (which I can't find).. And looking at my drive the either windows 7 is a REAL pig, or yup... my old data is eatting up my space with it's clutter. Although 7 is up, I want a redo.. Can anyone tell me how to do it right with a repartion and format?
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Dec 29, 2012
Tonight I was reformatting my external hard drive when I accidentally chose the wrong drive and reformatted my internal hard drive. My screen went black and now I have a computer with no operating to boot up. What are my chances of recovering? How can I recover my hard drive?
P. S. I tried doing a system restore and my disks hang on 80% completion twice now.
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Mar 18, 2012
My dad's laptop had gotten a bunch of viruses/rootkits, so I decided to use KillDisk and erase everything with one pass.
Everything gets done and I reinstall Win 7 Home Premium 64bit. Install everything and use the laptop like normal.
For the first five minutes, everything is fine. Loads programs up in a couple of settings.
After the five minutes, it starts getting very slow. The mouse is lagging. Everything takes a couple of minutes to load. The only thing I even did besides have it on was install Windows Update when you first reformat.
After a few more KillDisks and reformatting. the same problem is happening. I know rootkits are harder to kill than most, but can it be possible it is STILL alive?
I also am thinking maybe something inside the laptop is wrong (CPU, HDD.) How would I be able to check this to let you guys know? I will try the HP Recovery Manager in a while and see if there is any difference.
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Aug 9, 2012
I had the google redirect virus.. tried removing it myself through different methods.. still remained, so I decided to back up all my things and just reformat and reinstall. yesterday I did a dell factory image restore though, instead of doing a OS re-installation using my windows 7 disc, entering my product key etc (probably should have...)long story short: my mouse is lagging. i should note it started to lag before i did the factory restore also. at that point i figured it was just the virus/malware.but it's still here and driving me crazy. i googled and poked around the forums- following different advice to no avail. i performed all of the dell hardware diagnostic tests- passed them. i've done sfc /scannow 3+ times. tells me there are corrupt files but are unable to fix them. log shows:
2012-08-09 15:48:26, Info CSI 00000200 [SR] Cannot repair member file [l:20{10}]"tcpmon.ini" of Microsoft-Windows-Printing-StandardPortMonitor-TCPMonINI, Version = 6.1.7600.16385, pA = PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE_AMD64 (9), Culture neutral, VersionScope = 1 nonSxS,
[code]....
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Aug 11, 2011
Here is the link to the old foru:am trying to figure out if I should just go ahead and do a clean [re]install or create a partition first. I am not good with partitions.
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Apr 2, 2012
I've been directed over here by the malware board. My computer has a rootkit virus and it has been recommended to me that I reformat my hardrive. I am terrified of doing it wrong and would feel comfortable if one of your clever folk could help me through it. I have windows 7 home premium on a sony viao with a 64bit operating system. I can't seem to find any recovery disks,on the system restore options its seems i can only restore it to an earlier point in time.
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