Need Help with xp hardrive format

[florida_labtech]

I recently had a viruscorrupt about every file in my computer...suprisingly im still able to log onto the internet. All i want to know is how a format or quick format my hardrive if my cd-rom an d3.5 floppy drive dont work because of this virus eating the drivers to peices. Please help!!!!

[cpugeniusmv]

turn your computer off, turn it back on, and quickly put your XP CD in the cdrom drive.

then you will have the option during setup to format the hard drive.

note: you may have to change the boot order to include the cdrom before the hard drive. (in the BIOS)

[LPDad]

After you boot from your XP disc, continue to do a NEW install of WinXP.... when you are asked where you want it installed, choose to DELETE any existing partition (delete your C drive), then the next step will be to create a partition in the (newly created) unpartitioned space. Then just choose to install WinXP on the newly created partition. The next step will allow you to do a FULL Format with NTFS (or FAT32).

pretty easy.

[Fletch]

The NTFS is used for hdds over 20gb or something like that yeah? Just wondering, thought I read that somewhere in my travels.

[alliercollins]

Originally posted by Fletch
The NTFS is used for hdds over 20gb or something like that yeah? Just wondering, thought I read that somewhere in my travels.

I believe that it is limited to 32 gig partition sizes. So you could probably split your harddrive with partition magic or something.

[cpugeniusmv]

Originally posted by alliercollins
I believe that it is limited to 32 gig partition sizes. So you could probably split your harddrive with partition magic or something.

with the windows format tool, yes...it is limited to something around 32 GB. but if you use a 3rd party partition manager, you can make a significanly larger FAT32 partition.

a few of my 80 gig drives are completely FAT32 so i can move them between my linux and windows machines.

[alliercollins]

Hmm, thanks cpu. That was actually useful info. I have been contemplating setting linux back up one of these nights. Only thing is, last time I did it I ended up with a corrupted copy of like the 3rd disk of Red Hat, that was not fun when I had to download it twice more just to get a working disk.

What do you use for Linux? I was contemplating Suse or Mandrake this time around.

[cpugeniusmv]

Originally posted by alliercollins
Hmm, thanks cpu. That was actually useful info. I have been contemplating setting linux back up one of these nights. Only thing is, last time I did it I ended up with a corrupted copy of like the 3rd disk of Red Hat, that was not fun when I had to download it twice more just to get a working disk.

What do you use for Linux? I was contemplating Suse or Mandrake this time around.

for getting started, Mandrake, SuSE, and Fedora are the ones. I've had the most experience with mandrake, and I like it...but only to become acquainted

i've heard good things about SuSE, and i've used Fedora a little bit...i think you'd be fine any route you chose.

My current installations include Gentoo and Slackware (the latter being on a 50 mhz laptop with 5 mb of ram )

but i'll be moving to FreeBSD as soon as 5.3-RELEASE comes out. i've fallen in love with it.

[alliercollins]

That is a beast of a laptop. What do you do with it?

Thanks by the way for the info. I might install it on one of my pcs some night or dual boot it with 2003 server. I have been meaningto get back into playing around with it.

What was your first linux install? Mine I believe was early 98 with Mandrake. Ah... the good old days...

[cpugeniusmv]

Originally posted by alliercollins
That is a beast of a laptop. What do you do with it?

Thanks by the way for the info. I might install it on one of my pcs some night or dual boot it with 2003 server. I have been meaningto get back into playing around with it.

What was your first linux install? Mine I believe was early 98 with Mandrake. Ah... the good old days...

my first install was mandrake..........9.0 i think. it's been a while

[alliercollins]

I can't remember what number mine was. I know I have a copy of 7.1 that was from late 99, so maybe it was early 6s, late 5s. Linux has came a long way since then. I'm glad that people have continued to work on it, though I must say, that Real Networks move had me a little upset. I think it's only Red Hat and one other one though.

I'm not a fan of Real.

[cpugeniusmv]

Originally posted by alliercollins
I can't remember what number mine was. I know I have a copy of 7.1 that was from late 99, so maybe it was early 6s, late 5s. Linux has came a long way since then. I'm glad that people have continued to work on it, though I must say, that Real Networks move had me a little upset. I think it's only Red Hat and one other one though.

I'm not a fan of Real.

all hail the Real Alternative

[Wobbel]

Maybe you'll find this site interesting, Allie, lot's of linux iso's to be found here.
~click~

[alliercollins]

Thank you Wobbel. I am definetly going to be using that site.