How to format hard disk with win 7?

[momer79]

Hi,

I have got a laptop with win 7 on it. There is only one drive in laptop which is C: , I want to wipe the hard disk and install win xp professional on it.

1- How can i format the hard disk which has win 7 on it?
2- After formating the hard disk, would i able to install the window 7 through recovery disk which i have already made incase anything goes wrong?

 

[DeaconFrost]

First, you'll want to make sure all of your drivers are available for Windows XP. You are replacing a nearly two year old OS with an over eleven year old OS...so make sure you have what you need first.

That being said, you can use any app, or even the XP install disc to blank the drive and then continue with the install. As far as I know, the recovery disc should let you reinstall to the way the computer was when you bought it. If it is a system recovery disc, from the manufacturer, or made with their tools, then you should be ok.

 

[fseal]

You would put in your XP disk and during the initial installation phase go into the manual partition management and delete all the partitions on the drive, then continue with the XP install.

If you imaged your 7 disk (all partitions) and saved the images (using whatever third party imaging program you have or get) then you should be able to simply put the images back on to restore it. Any other mechanism.. maybe, maybe not. User data may be gone or drivers hard to come by depending on the mechanism.

If you are talking about the recovery disks from the laptop manufacturer then you will /likely/ be able to restore it back to factory defaults (all user data gone). THey are generally made to be booted off of and they wips the drive and put the original image back on. But there are variationson that mechanism by manufacturer so no guarantees on how it actually works

 

[Mike Connor]

If you have installation discs for both Windows 7 and Windows XP, you can install whatever you want.

Before you make any changes to proprietary systems, make sure you have backed up any drivers you may need for future installations.

To install a new system, just place the installation disc in the dvd drive and boot the machine.

Regards....Mike Connor

 

[johnnya]

Just a quick word of caution. You said "would i able to install the window 7 through recovery disk which i have already made incase anything goes wrong?" If you are referring to having made a complete set ( usually 3 to 5 DVD's) of factory restore disk's, you should be alright to go back to factory condition in the future.
If however, you only made a Windows recovery CD, then you could be left with no way back home.
Just a thought.
Regards
JohnnyA

 

[gregrocker]

Hi,

I have got a laptop with win 7 on it. There is only one drive in laptop which is C: , I want to wipe the hard disk and install win xp professional on it.

1- How can i format the hard disk which has win 7 on it?
2- After formating the hard disk, would i able to install the window 7 through recovery disk which i have already made incase anything goes wrong?

I would not format the Recovery Partition as it is the most stable method to factory recover, with the disks made from the partition being less stable.

However if you have a stored Win7 backup image of your current Win7 install you are happy with, then you could use it in place of factory Recovery and just save the Recovery Disks as a backup.

 

[whs]

i assume you got the message by now. But just to reemphasize: Image everything and burn the recovery CD for the imaging program. That is your safest path back to where you are now. Because as Deacon said, it is not guaranteed that your XP experimant will succeed. Finding all the drivers may be difficult.