wiping hard drive

wayne

hi i have just bought a new computer for my daughter.she has stored all her files off her old one on to discs and i need to wipe the hard drive now.do i just go to add/remove and uninstall everything or is there some other way of doing it?thanks in advance.

chriswuk_2

Goto into DOS & type "Format C:"

WARNING - This will permanently wipe the Hard Disk Drive !!!

albertross_2

what are you going to do with the old PC when you've finished with it?

wayne

hi thanks for replies how do i get into dos?as for old computer i,m going to ask one of my nephews if he wants it.

nielingren

Start > run then type "cmd" then a black box should come up

BillScarab

If you do this it will remove everything, including windows. Is this what you want to do or do you just want to remove personal data. Have you got a disc so you can re-install windows if required?

David_B_2

wayne wrote:

hi i have just bought a new computer for my daughter.she has stored all her files off her old one on to discs and i need to wipe the hard drive now.do i just go to add/remove and uninstall everything or is there some other way of doing it?thanks in advance.

What do you mean by wipe?

If you want to remove everything and then reinstall the OS simply then re-install the windows operating system first. At this stage you can get it format (wipe) your drive for you.

bat999

Hi wayne

If you go into DOS and format C it will wipe EVERYTHING off your disk - including the Windows operating system.

Your nephew won't be pleased about that (unless he is a whizkid and knows how to reinstall Windows himself).

If you want to leave Windows on for him just DELETE all the personal files and then empty the trash bin.

wayne

thanks for the replies folks.i just want to get rid of personal stuff is all so i,ll go with bats suggestion.

albertross_2

For a general cleanup, delete all your personal files, then run these one after the other (tick all the boxes).

http://www.ccleaner.com/
http://www.theabsolute.net/sware/clndisk.html

travel_freak

Hi

I was interested to read the posts above. I have an old PC with Windows 98 on which I've been trying to get set up for AOL broadband. I've had a lot of helpful posts on another thread but unfortunately still haven't been able to get this to work. Also when trying to get help from AOL they told me that their broadband won't work with 98 anyway, that I have to have at least 98SE for it to work.

Anyway, to cut a long story short, I'm about to try to load on new software in place of Windows 98. If I first copy the personal files I want to keep, what is the best way of loading on the new software?

Should I firstly "completely" delete everything (using one of the suggestions above) or can I just add the software over the top of everything that's already there, or is this likely to pose future problems?

If I should just add the software, how do I do it? Sorry, I'm fairly clueless!

Many thanks for any advice.

REgards