Before Reformatting, Reinstalling

or Upgrading your PC

Do your homework.   Do a bit of reading and things will go smoothly for you.
Here are some links to articles that tell you how to reinstall, reformat or upgrade.  

For Windows 95:

http://www.troubleshooters.com/tfresh95/index.htm

http://www.pcguide.com/proc/sw/w95inst.htm

http://www.unc.edu/~wwebber/page/format.html

For Windows 98x

http://www.everythingcomputers.com/reformat.htm

http://www.cyberwalker.net/columns/jul99/2907.html

http://www.bholcomb.com/formatting.html

For Windows XP

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/home/using/howto/gettingstarted/guide/newinstallation.asp

http://www.windowsreinstall.com/indexwinxp.htm

http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/windowsxp_sg_clean.asp   This shows you exactly what  you are going to see as you install

CHECKLIST before you Reformat;

Before you reformat your HD, make a checklist of what you need to save (backup)  Then a checklist of what you need to reinstall.

Sometimes it's the ORDER of how you install something that makes the difference in a good install or not.

I have a checklist that I use, and you may add or delete for your own use:

Checklist.txt

*I have also put it down at the bottom of this page so you can look it over to see if you want or not

Need to reformat your HD  BUT you lost your Driver Disks or CD-ROM?

All is not lost!      http://www.fileplanet.com/files/120000/126347.shtml


WinDriver Expert is FREEWARE, provides you the easy and fast detection and backup of the entire hardware device drivers currently on your system. Just one or two mouse button clicks, you will have all your hardware devices retracted and backed-up to any folder you want. Also a INF device script installer is included.

When you reinstall or upgrade your Windows system, you will find the backup drivers very useful.

The software is most applicable to those who has lost one or more Driver Disk or Driver CD-ROM for a certain hardware, as long as the hardware device functions correctly on your current system.

What it does is grab the as-installed .INF files and associated device drivers from your current system, and backs them up to a designated location. Later, if--- or when--- you need to reinstall your OS, you won't have to dig out the original disks or CDs when Windows says "New Device Detected." Instead, just point Windows to the backup location, and all the necessary INF and drivers files will already be there, ready to go.

Boot Disks

Need to reformat your HD? you need a boot-up disk

Windows 95

How to make a boot up floppy WITH CD-ROM Support:

Its pretty easy to make a boot disk ....All you have to do is open the Add/Remove Programs Control Panel. To do that, click on the Start button, go up to Settings, select Control Panel from the list of available choices and when the Control Panel window opens, just double click on Add/Remove Programs. Once that's open, click on the Startup Disk tab and click on Create Disk…

But NOT with CD-ROM Support for Windows 95 !!

The "simple" answer to this problem is to just install your CD-ROM driver onto the disk—that's the answer most magazines and books will give you. The problem is, they don't tell you how to do that.  This page shows you how to do that

http://www.everythingcomputers.com/windows_boot_disk.htm

Windows 98 Boot Disk

Click on the Start button, go up to Settings, select Control Panel from the list of available choices and when the Control Panel window opens, just double click on Add/Remove Programs. Once that's open, click on the Startup Disk tab and click on Create Disk

Win ME Boot Disk

http://www.duxcw.com/digest/Howto/software/windows/winme/startup/page1.html

Windows XP
Make a bootable FLOPPY!

If you have just reformatted your HD, you now need to:

• Set First Boot device in Bios to CD-Rom     (XP uses the CD Rom drive to boot-up)
• Insert your Windows XP CD
• Save and Exit the Bios, the system will now boot of the Windows XP CD-Rom

Sometimes your system will NOT let you do that..........so you need a backup plan......you need a bootable floppy for XP!

Windows XP Professional Utility: Setup Disks for Floppy Boot Install
The Windows XP startup disk allows computers without a bootable CD-ROM to perform a new installation of the operating system. The Windows XP startup disk will automatically load the correct drivers to gain access to the CD-ROM drive and start a new installation of Setup. You cannot upgrade from a Windows XP startup disk.

Windows XP Professional startup disks will not work for Windows XP Home Edition installations and vice-versa.
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/release.asp?releaseid=33291

Windows® XP Home Edition Utility: Setup Disks for floppy boot install.
The Windows XP startup disk allows computers without a bootable CD-ROM to perform a new installation of the operating system. The Windows XP startup disk will automatically load the correct drivers to gain access to the CD-ROM drive and start a new installation of Setup. You cannot upgrade from a Windows XP startup disk.

Windows XP Home Edition startup disks will not work for Windows XP Professional installations and vice-versa. http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/release.asp?releaseid=33290

Creating a Boot Disk for an NTFS or FAT Partition

This article describes how to create a Windows boot disk to access a drive with a faulty boot sequence on an Intel x86-processor-based computer

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?ID=KB;EN-US;Q311073

How to make a CD-ROM boot disk

http://www.nu2.nu/bootcd/

This page is for you if you want to:

Create bootable CD-Rom's on a regular basis
Build and burn fully automatic (optional blank CDRW before burn)
Create a bootable CD-ROM with multiple boot images
Create a Dos bootable CD-ROM using a hardware independent CD-ROM driver (for SCSI and ATAPI)

Miscellaneous

Windows 98 Registry Checker

http://www.microsoft.com/windows98/usingwindows/maintaining/tips/advanced/registry.asp

Dual Boot with Win98 and 2000

http://www.techtv.com/screensavers/windowstips/story/0,24330,3338930,00.html

10 ways to make your WindowsME run better:

http://content.techweb.com/winmag/windows/features/merunbetter/default.htm

How to manually remove Windows 2000 and Restore Windows 95 or Windows 98

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=KB;EN-US;Q250456&

Windows 2000 Troubleshooting

http://www.microsoft.com/windows2000/en/server/help/default.asp?url=/windows2000/en/server/help/troubleshooter_overview.htm

Windows 2000/NT Software Downloads

http://www.ntware.com/

A Description of the Safe Mode Boot Options in Windows XP

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;Q315222

Troubleshooting Windows XP

http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp.htm

Windows XP/2000/NT Shareware Hall of Fame

http://www.wugnet.com/shareware/ntmap.asp

Multi-booting with Windows XP

You can install two or more operating systems on your computer, and then choose the one that you want to use each time you restart. This is known as multibooting. You can configure your computer to start Windows XP, Windows 2000, Windows NT, and either Windows 95 or Windows 98.

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/using/howto/gettingstarted/multiboot.asp

*Check List for Reformatting