Formating C drive on XP - how can I

mamaduke

Hi, PC has crashed we are having to wipe it all & start again.
How can we format C drive on XP when XP will not start?
We have an XP disk, we can use A & C drive but D & E are not recognised.
Anyone help please in simple terms?
many thanks Mamaduke

superscaper

Boot from CD. Go into bios tell it to boot from cd first. Boot from the windows cd. Do a fresh install, make sure it deletes any existing partitions....

wakandem

Check in the bios settings the boot order and make sure cd rom is selected as 1st boot. Boot up and the cd should be read and windows should start up. press enter to install xp and it will show the disks. delete the c partition and then install in there it will give you the option to format.

Chippy_Minton

The XP CD allows you to format and partition the drive as part of installing Windows. See http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/windowsxp_sg_clean.asp

Post the exact error you get when you boot the computer and we might be able to fix the problem without reformatting and having to start again.

If you have to reformat, backup any important files (documents, photos, email etc.) first using a recovery CD to get access to the drive.

mamaduke

I have tried to install from the XP system disc but it gets as far as inspecting the hard drive and stops. I have left it for several hours just in case

crox

You could try chkdsk /r from a recovery console. This is of the top of my head, but at some point of the install xp allows you to try to recover an existing installation, have a read of this http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314058 not easy going I'm afraid.
When you get to c:\ type chkdsk /r