How do I clear OS and start over?

[jkac123]

I want clear dos and windows and start fresh.what is the best way to approach this?

[Idnew]

Are you wanting to format? Wipe everything off your HD and start over? If so you will need a boot disk and make sure you have all your drivers. If this is what you want to do post back.

[jkac123]

Yes I want to wipe it all. I have DOS 6.2 and winme. what steps do I take to reformat it all?

[NDC]

1) Boot the system using a Windows Boot diskette.

2) At the A: prompt, type: format c:

Ex: A:\>format c: (C being the drive letter you want to format)

(You can also add the /s if you want to make the formatted disk bootable, but that won't be necessary since you're probably going to install the OS from the CDROM)

3) After the format has been completed, you can go ahead and install the OS!

[G]

Dear jkac123,

Some of the following instructions may be familiar to you. There are some additional instructions, which you may not be aware of that may set your problem straight.

1. Place a bootable diskette in to the floppy drive immediately after power on (make sure that your bios settings, start-up options/sequence indicates that the first start-up drive is the floppy drive or a:\> )
2. You will be presented with the a:\> prompt
3. At the a:\> prompt type dir Hence, you will have a:\>dir (Press enter (return key)
4. A screen will appear with the contents of your bootable floppy disk.
5. The file which you require is called Fdisk
6. At the a:\> prompt type Fdisk Hence, you will have a:\>Fdisk (Press enter (return key)
7. A screen will appear stating at the bottom ‘Do you wish to enable large disk support (Y/N)’. Indicate Y for yes.
8. The next screen represents Fdisk options. These range from 1-4 (but you may have fives options if you have more than one HD connected to your computer)
9. To establish the state of your hard drive, go to option 4 (Display partition information)
10. This screen will either show that you have a partitioned hard drive or that no partition(s) were detected. If a partition is detected it will inform you which partition is the active partition.
11. If no partition(s) were detected, and bearing in mind that you will need a partitioned hard drive in order to format your hard drive; press Esc to get out of this screen and back to the Fdisk option screen. (Bear with me for now. This information is simply for completeness).
12. Press Fdisk option 1 (Create dos partition or logical disc drive)
13. The Create dos partition or logical disk dive menu screen appears
14. Press create dos partition or logical disk drive option 1 (Create primary dos partition). It is necessary to have a primary partition otherwise you will not be able to install Windows. You can stipulate the size you would like your primary partition to be. Any other partitions you wish to have will be up to you.
15. Press Esc and go back to the Fdisk options screen
16. Press Fdisk options 2 (Set active partition). You will need to do this if you wish to install Windows. Follow the instructions. It is self-explanatory. (Create an active partition or change it.).
17. Press Esc until you arrive back at Fdisk options.
18. Press Fdisk options 4 (Display partition information)
19. You should find that you now have one primary partition, which is ‘active’. (This procedure will help you to manipulate the active partition of a single HD).
20. Press Esc until you arrive at the a:\> prompt
21. Warm boot (reboot) your computer and place a bootable diskette in to the floppy drive immediately after power on.
22. At the a:\> type format c:/s (This MS-Dos switch may not happen because c:> will not have any system files on it and for the simple fact that no Ram will make it impossible to use this switch). The difficulty here is that if you are using an EBD (Emergency Boot Disc) you will need to insert your EBD, restart your computer, and change directories to the drive letter of your CD-ROM drive (usually one drive letter ahead of where it typically resides because of the RAM drive created by EBD). If EBD still does not boot your CD-ROM then the drivers on your EBD do not include your CD-ROM device driver or a generic device driver to do the job instead. You will need to edit your Config.sys file adding the necessary line for your CD-ROM device driver and maybe even installing the CD-ROM device driver on to the EBD.
23. Hence, you have something like d:\>format(space)c:/s (Note also if you receive a ‘Bad command’ or ‘Bad file name’ error message, you will need to extract the Format.com tool to boot your disc.
24. Type at the prompt , hence, a:>extract(space)ebd.cab(space)format.com
25. After Format.com is extracted to your boot disk and the MS-Dos command prompt is displayed, type format c:/s (e.g., d:>format(space)c:/s). Alternatively, type format drive: for partition(s) not marked as your active partition. Follow the instruction on the screen. I have already explained what to do in the above explanation so I will not repeat myself.
26. The /s switch will copy system files to the ‘c’ partition on your hard drive. The system files are essential if you wish to install Windows. Without the system file, the partition will not be recognised.
27. Restart (boot) your computer with your bootable diskette in place and either indicate that you wish to use CD-ROM support or go to the prompt for your CD-ROM and type setup.exe. Hence, it may look something like this: d:>setup.exe
28. Your windows CD-ROM will start spinning using both methods and Windows will start installing itself on to your c:>.

I hope this is of help. Let me know how you get on.

All the best,
G