I have formatted the drive on my laptop and reloaded the programs from disk (XP) and have a few questions.
1. Reloading the programs from disk was pretty straightforward but downloading and installing the Windows service packs, updates and patches etc took hours (on broadband).
Can I back up these updates to disk so in future I can save all the downloading time and what exactly do I save? I looked in the files and just don�t know where to start!
2. After loading the various programs from disk and a few others such as AVG, Zone Alarm etc but prior to downloading the Windows updates the disk space used was about 3Gb. After downloading the service packs etc the disk space used jumped to over 9Gb! (yet, when I add up the individual folder sizes, it comes to only 4.4Gb)
Do the Windows updates take up an extra 6Gb? And where are they hiding?
I need to get my HDD reformatted with the help of a paid technician.Couple of weeks ago he used the quick format method & asked him if that would make any difference & he said really not.I have the doubts though. I kind of wonder why would Windows then give a choice if there really wasn’t any difference?
i`m using maxtor 200gb divided into 4 partitions c: is for the operating system and d,e,f only data. i want to reinstall windows only on c: cause i think the registry is pretty sick CAN I FORMAT ONLY C: DRIVE AND REINSTALL WINDOWS WITHOUT CAUSING ANY DAMAGE TO D.E,F DRIVES?
I need to re-format my hard drive. I cannot do it throught the MS-DOS prompt in Windows XP Home Edition due to the File Structure on the hard drive. Is there any way to bypass the Windows boot and go directly to a MS-DOS prompt on start-up?
I have a Toshiba Portege running Windows XP Tablet Edition. and those of you who own them know they don't have a CD drive.I forgot my passwords and I cannot figure out what they are. I have the files on my other laptop to format it. But the problem is I don't know how to do it without a CD drive.I want to try it from my 1 gig thumbdrive but I can't find a good guide to be able to put it on there and format it.
I want to do a clean sweep on my hard drive. What is the best way to do this? Should I use my XP set-up CD or start the process from the command prompt? Also any suggestions on what programs for spyware, malware, etc. that I can run with Trend Micro's Internet Security?
I need help with formatting in XP. I was just curious if I could format a 16mb drive and card (JAMP3 player) to a Win98 Fat16 using XP? Apparently the thing won't work otherwise. Of course I could rebuild my old PC with Win98, but trying to avoid that.
I want to FDisk or Format my hard drive. When I open the Command Prompt (W2K), and enter FDisk (from the root, C:), it doesn't recognize that command. When I try "Format C:" and then provide the Volume Label, it says: Volume in use by another process. Format may run if this volume is dismounted first. ... Would you like to force a dismount on this volume?" I answer Y, but then get: "Cannot lock the drive. The volume is still in use." What can I do to "unuse" the volume?
I've tried to install fresh version of Win XP pro. However, as XP tries to format to 100%, before formatting is complete, I get the error saying it cannot format the drive due to "drive damage." At first I thought it was because I had a dead Hard Drive. So I then used a spare drive I had on hand, but again got the same error. I then went out and got a brand new one, but again, got the same error. I now don't believe the hard drives are dead, but something else is wrong. I've tried using another XP home disc I had, and got the same error.
i have a primary hard drive working fine and added another hard drive 80gig maxtor as a slave and i'm using win xp pro.
i know there's computer management menu here in winxp, my question is:on how to format then partition my second hd,into 2(40 gig and 40 gig).basically i need the correct steps or commands.
I installed Windows XP SP2 Professional on it like a week ago. But instead of erasing everything on it, the computer now gives me a choice between booting with Windows XP, Windows 2000 which I installed a while ago, and just Windows which is ME and has been there for a long time. Now I just wanna format the hd, get rid of everything, and start fresh with just Windows XP.
So I tried going to Command Prompt and typing "Format C:". It gave me the whole this is NTFS, type volume label and its gonna delete all data are you sure, I did all that. Then, it said " Format cannot run because the volume is in use by another process. Format may run if this volume is dismounted first. ALL OPEN HANDLES TO THIS VOLUME WOULD THEN BE INVALID. Would you like to force a dismount on this volume? <Y/N>. I said yes. Then it says " Cannot lock the drive. The volume is still in use.
this might seem a lame question here but can someone please tell me how to make a Bootable CD so i can boot my computer from this bootable CD and reformat my C drive without using my windows cd.
I have Vista,I have another drive,but it's currently not available to use.What I want to do is to get a Cruzer Micro 2GB,and format it to have a bootup for Windows XP. Would it permanently damage the flash drive in any way?
my parents pc was running super slow, like taking 10 mins to boot which it never use to, so i decided to format. All was going how it normally does when i fix computers and then it gets to 3% of formatting and suddenly jumps to 12 then gets to 100% really quickly and states format could not complete as the drive is corrupt, pick another drive.
So i restart try again same thing happens, ive tryed unplugging the cables etc but none of it works.
So i figure the drive must have something wrong, load the recovery console via the disk and trying do a chkdsk where i get the message
I am officially past aggravated. I needed to reformat an internal hard drive on a Gateway Laptop 7322GZ, 60GB drive. I am using a Windows XP Pro Upgrade CD (along with a full version of Windows 98SE for verification) and I deleted all partitions and set it to format the entire disk. Did not select quick format NTFS, just regular Format NTFS..
Am trying to do new installation (clean install) of windows xp pro and cant seem to get the option of formatting the drive.All it seems to do is rewrite over the previous installations(even though I choose new installation option).Since trying to reinstall I also keep getting the error "cant find c:windowssystem32oolsdelfolders.exe." It doesnt seem to be causing any problems as such as I can still use my computer but I would really like to format and get rid of any crap.Any ideas?Also clicking on C
how to reformat my hard drive? I'm trying to load XP Pro but when I put the disc in it tells me that the version on my computer is newer than the one I'm trying to put in so it can't install it. So how do I format from XP Home edition?
i have an old computer that has windows xp professional on it and i would like to format the hard drive so nothing can be recoverd because we are going to though the computer
i have a system that is running xp and i need to format the hard drive due to a new mobo. in the past i have tried and i ran into a problem that you already have an os installed. what is the best way to format in xp?
I'm having problems formatting a hdd to install Winxp. A friend gave me his old HP 743a comp (2.4 Ghz, 512 mb ram) because the monitor kept going black. I am fairly sure the problem was one of the CPU heatsink clips was broken and not allowing contact between heatsink and cpu. It doesn't go black now that I have fixed the clip. He removed his HDD, so I bought a second hand 10 Gb just to see if I could get the thing running. I formatted the HDD with a win98se boot disk. Everything goes well except I can't get the "start with cdrom support" page to come up. The Cd drive is a CD-RW/DVD combo drive (32 x 10 x 12 x 40x). Sorry I can't find the brand and model number at the moment. I did check up on it a week ago and it's only supported by win2000 and winxp. I was wondering if this could be the problem?
I need to format my harddrive and re-install XP pro, but I don't know how to do it, do someone out there know where to find an easy guide to boot from CD. Cause it would be nice with a print so I can format my computer step by step. I'm not so brainy when dealing with BIOS.
i just got a new harddrive and i am not able to install windows xp on it.the harddrive is a 250gb ide. scandisk shows nothing. after running the xp setup from the cd, it copies the files and reboots, after which i get the message: "A disk read error occured, press ALT CTRL DEL to restart".i can't format the drive, its got a lot of important data on it.
I need to format a laptop and boot as C:drive only don't need windows software. just clean boot disk.anyone know what software to use to format clean c:drive and load to c:drive .
I have made a boot diskette , added smartdrv , but won't accept the smartdrv command, I'm slowly going crazy How do I get to BIOS, and how do I configure to startup from cd drive ??
I'm unable to format my C: drive after erasing it.I have a Dell XPS 2 with two 250GB hard drives. (Other specs are listed below.) I got it in 2003, I think. I want to sell it, so in preparation, I tried to clean and format the hard drives. I used Darik's Boot and Nuke to do the job. The cleaning went fine until the end, when I got a message saying the process was complete but there had been some non-fatal errors because of some bad sectors.I couldn't boot up the computer afterward, of course, because I forgot to make a boot up disk. I tried using the Windows XP installation CD, but all I got when restarting the computer was a "press F1 to retry, F2 to setup" message. I can enter the BIOS, and I put the CD-player at the top of the boot disk, but no good.Anyway, I got a boot disk and can now get to the A: prompt. I used FDISK to create 1 FAT32 primary DOS partition on each hard drive. After restarting, I then tried FORMAT, but after hitting "Y", I got this message: "Fatal error writing setting disk access flags...format terminated. Error Code: 05". I did a google search and found that other people have encountered that message, but unfortunately I didn't understand any of the details...
Also, after partitioning the hard drives, I now get this message when trying to boot from the CD (or just from the hard drive): "partition signature != 55AA".So, I'm at a loss. Because I don't have convenient access to a floppy drive, and because I'm not sure my CD drive is working correctly, I'm hoping someone might be able to suggest a solution that involves use of a USB flash drive. A google search showed me that such things were possible, but the solutions were a little beyond my tech skills.The only other piece of info I can offer is that attempting to DIR the C: drive gives me an "invalid media" message.
I just put together a desktop with an Asus A7V880 mobo and after I installed XP on my Seagate SATA Baracuda 7200.1 120Gb harddrive I was running windows and it shutdown and said it had to shutdown to protect my computer and now I think there is some corrupt data onit that will not delete off the hard drive.I have tried many many differe nt things to delete the drive so I can reinstall windows onit.It shows up in my computer in the bios but not in windows windows and will not format either.I just bought a seagate 40Gb hardrive just like it for the computer also I have installed windows onit and it runs good ,but it sometimes tells me it has to studown to protect computer to but it will still reboot.I have ran Seatools on the hard drive and it finds errors on the drive and ask me if I want to repair them and I do and it shows them as repaired.It says passed after repair right,then I try to rescan it again to see if it fixed them ,but it the errors still show up again just like the first seatools scan.I have just about ran out of options on how to delete the hard drive.
I have a gateway running windows xp. I had a virus and ran mcafee. It told me to reboot so I did and now nothing happens. hte gateway screen comes up and nothing after that it just stays on the gateway screen. I can't enter safe mode and it will not read my recovery disk. I called gateway and they told me that because my computer is out of the warranty, they would be happy to help me and then gave me three payment options. I have come to grips that I will need to format the hard drive, but I just don't know how to get it to that point. the only thing that happens is the gateway screen and the fan runs really loud.
I want to remove windows xp home off my laptop, I had to install a new hard drive and when I installed windows xp I found out I didn't have the drivers disk so nothing works. I went to Dell site to get drivers and there are hundreds of them, the ones I did download wont work. So I want to reformat my harddrive and go back to ME. but I can't. What can I use to FORMAT this hard drive?
my computer is running slow, i can recieve email but not send, i cant restore back to another date so im told by bt and others to format my hard drive any tips as boyfriends says it has to go back to shop to do that.
