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Question About Reformatting XP


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#1
Wyrm

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One day, without any obvious reason or error message, my laptop decided to stop booting correctly. It does not enter Windows and gives me the five startup options (We're sorry for the inconvenience... etc). After chatting with tech support for my computer they told me that the only way to fix the problem was format it, and that there was no way to save the data on the harddrive without a harddrive transfer with another laptop.

So after some tinkering of my own I managed to save my files by networking my laptop to my PC. To do this I installed a second copy of Windows. Now that I have my files off of my laptop I want to whipe it clean, removing both OS's and doing a fresh install of Windows. When I put the disk in and try to delete the partition it gives a warning that it is the system partition and it is not recommended to delete these. Is deleting the same as formatting? Because after looking through the Help and Support center under formatting it tells me "You cannot format a disk if files are open on the disk, the contents of the disk are displayed, or the disk contains the system or boot partition."

So how do I reformat without permanently screwing it up?
If you need anymore information I'll gladly give it.
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#2
urichjones

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Are you trying to delete the partition from windows or from the windows setup screen? The windows setup screen is all blue with white text and comes up before windows loads up. Also are you reinstalling XP or something else?

If you backed up all of your important files onto another computer you can format the computer in setup and reinstall windows. Sometimes windows won't give you this option unless you delete and recreate the partition first, which it will give you that option. Also make sure you have all of you drivers.

A good tutorial for reinstalling windows xp can be found here

I hope this helps,

Urich

Edited by urichjones, 19 July 2005 - 06:09 PM.

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#3
gerryf

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go ahead, delete the partition, then create a new one and format that.
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#4
Wyrm

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Doing so as I type this. Thanks. :tazz:
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