OT/ COMPUTER FORMATING C DRIVE

[Anonymous-0]

I have been pretty busy with snow / ice, and did not get a chance to format my C drive. I asked a week or so ago as to how to do so. I was given many suggestions, and nothing seems to work. I have little to loose in al reality, and was told by my internet provider that it was my only way. I also talked to everyone except Bill Gates in person--over 4 1/2 hrs at microsoft, and they came to the same conclusion--must format c drive.

I have tried a few different comands, and my screen (black) says--

The type of file system is NTFS

WARNING, ALL DATA ON NON-REMOVABLE DISK DRIVE C WILL BE LOST! Proceed with Format (Y?N)? =====I type y and get this message


Format cannot run because the volume is in use by another process. Format may run if this volumn is dismounted first. ALL OPEN HANDLES TO THIS VOLUME WOULD THEN BE INVALID. Would you like to force a dismount on this volume? (Y/N)

I then type Y===== Then my screen goes to my windows xp with all the icons---blue sky-green grass etc.

Remember I ain't had much school housin an all---my mom was a prostitute, and the hung my dad for stealin horses--so don't expect much from me OK.

I tried to google comands-comands C: and a whole bunch of other attempts with nothing coming up.

I'm using vista on my sons computer now, but he has to use it alot--takes it with him, so i'm kind of limited for a responce.

I was simply amazed at the rapid responce by so many helpful folks with my last post. I feel asking elswhere other than at YT is kinda like cheating on my wife--just can't do that.

So A very gratful thank you to all that responded on my last post--and thanks in advance for this one.

last post was 11-29-2007 labled OT/ computer formating hard drive NE / IA

I live in Garnavillo Ia 9 miles West of the big river-20 min SW of Prarie Du Chine Wisconson on HWY 52.

It will read from my CD sometimes, but not always. Will never write to CD however.

I hope I got all the questions answered, and thanks again for your help. NE

 

[Allan in NE]

Can ya see the A drive yet? IF you put a disc in it, will the computer read it?

Allan

 

[Anonymous-0]

Hi

You need to make yourself a floppy boot bisk with the format and fdisk comand on it. From a working PC get to a command prompt and type in : format a: /s This will format the a: and put the system files on it so it will boot. Then you need to copy the format and fdisk files to the floppy. type copy format.* a: enter and copy fdisk.* a: This will coppy the files you need to the a: Boot your dead PC with the floppy disk and type in format c: /s this will format the c: and place the system files on it so you can boot from the c: Hope that this helps.
Dennis Goesmann
goesy53

 

[Howard H.]

As I mentioned last time, you do not have to format the drive to reinstall Windows cleanly from scratch.

You cannot format the C: drive, anyway, once it has booted up into Windows, since it "knows" that would be "pulling the carpet out from under itself".

If you boot it up on a Windows install CD, you can tell it you want to reinstall Windows from scratch. If you are dead set on formatting it, you can also at that point tell it to format and which filesystem type you choose - and it will - since you are booted up on the CDROM and not the hard drive.

I only format the hard drives if I suspect bad sectors on a physically ailing hard drive. The format process will mark them off limits at that point.

The advantage to not formatting is is will leave all your files out there for retrieval once the new Windows comes up...

But it just depends on the scenario as to which is best...

Howard

 

[onefarmer ISP Tech]

First which windows do you have? Sounds like 2000 or XP.

You are tring to format c: from with in Windows and this cannot be done. To format you have to boot of another drive whether it is a floppy (a) drive or a cd drive.

If you have your windows cd put it in the cd drive and boot off it. From there you can reformat and reinstall windows.

Before you do that I recommend you open the Device Manager and write down which video card, sound card, and modem you have and make sure you have the drivers on a disk somewhere.