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Reformatting Question
Posted: Thu Aug 21, 2008 4:33 pm
by Xyzzzy
Alright, this one is kind of odd and I couldn't find an article for it on google, so I figured I'd come bug you guys for help
I currently have two harddrives I want to reformat. Both have windows installed on them. Since I don't have my windows disks, (xp came installed on this computer all ready to go) I was wondering if it was possible to reformat one disk and run windows from the other then reverse the process so that I never had to reinstall windows.
Any input would be appreciated
This just occurred to me that not getting a clean windows installation voids the whole point of reformatting doesn't it -.-
Re: Reformatting Question
Posted: Thu Aug 21, 2008 5:54 pm
by cpinney
Xyzzzy wrote:
This just occurred to me that not getting a clean windows installation voids the whole point of reformatting doesn't it -.-
yes, yes it does.
Re: Reformatting Question
Posted: Thu Aug 21, 2008 9:10 pm
by Inuyasha584
im guessing it was an HP computer, press f11!
Re: Reformatting Question
Posted: Thu Aug 21, 2008 11:31 pm
by emperor3000
Try talking about it to your manufacture person thingy ma jiggy,
Or go geek squad for help

Re: Reformatting Question
Posted: Fri Aug 22, 2008 12:01 am
by Alterran
well actualy u can go with this just keep 1 drive for windows only and keep the other for games ect and make sure u regularly scan both drives and it will work,
option two is a varriant of the above you could format 1 drive
then copy the windows stuff off drive 2 and put it on 1 when u want to format the other which should work if the main drive you have is set as a master for your cable settings
Re: Reformatting Question
Posted: Fri Aug 22, 2008 1:19 am
by Xyzzzy
Inuyasha584 wrote:im guessing it was an HP computer, press f11!
yes hp, and no I'm scared
I'm thinking maybe a stick of ram blew out because my computer got slow as hell about 3 days ago.
How do you check?
Re: Reformatting Question
Posted: Fri Aug 22, 2008 1:27 am
by Inuyasha584
Xyzzzy wrote:Inuyasha584 wrote:im guessing it was an HP computer, press f11!
yes hp, and no I'm scared
I'm thinking maybe a stick of ram blew out because my computer got slow as hell about 3 days ago.
How do you check?
thats how i reformated mine press F11 when the HP logo shows up and i stole your ram!
Re: Reformatting Question
Posted: Fri Aug 22, 2008 1:32 am
by [SD]Master_Wong
why dont you make a restore disc iv never made one myself since the good ol days of 98 but im sure xp has that feature
Re: Reformatting Question
Posted: Fri Aug 22, 2008 8:45 am
by Priam
[SD]Master_Wong wrote:why dont you make a restore disc iv never made one myself since the good ol days of 98 but im sure xp has that feature
This.
It's usually the first step when you buy a PC with an OEM version of windows.
Re: Reformatting Question
Posted: Fri Aug 22, 2008 1:51 pm
by [SD]Master_Wong
Iv always had them supplied that and iv got full copys of xp everywhere and office, i use to make pirate versions

pointles now tho no one wants to buy them
Re: Reformatting Question
Posted: Mon Aug 25, 2008 8:59 pm
by user
@Xyzzzy i am thinking about Norton ghost, are you?
Re: Reformatting Question
Posted: Mon Aug 25, 2008 9:01 pm
by Xyzzzy
user wrote:@Xyzzzy i am thinking about Norton ghost, are you?
no

Re: Reformatting Question
Posted: Mon Aug 25, 2008 9:18 pm
by StealMySoda
Use the internal restore if you've got it. It works fine. Just leave it to do its thing for a while.
Failing that, there should be a way to burn it to disk. However it takes forever. As it burns. Then verifies the disks (rightly so) for about 6 million billion hours. Then, even after that my old set of disks was corrupt. But oh well

I had another recovery disk from my laptop.
Now I have both Vista and XP recovery disks which I'm sure will come in handy at some point

Oh forgot to mention. IF you're still within HP's warranty. Just call em up and say when you try to burn your restore disks it gives you the error "this machine is not capable of burning disks" they should just send you em for free

What I did to get my Vista disks, however I actually had that error but they asked virtually no questions and I only spent about 5 minutes (waiting and talking) in total on the phone to them, so its well worth the hassle (or lack there of).