help formatting a drive

Walsandrew

Walsandrew

Walsandrew

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Joined
23 Oct 2010
Posts
339
Location
Compton, CA
hi. i hope this wouldn't have been better placed elsewhere but i was asking in the windows software section and getting no responses there so i am sure someone here can help. recently purchased a prebuilt system from ocuk with an ssd. foolishly when i went to install win7 however, i installed on the other hard drive and not the ssd. so now i need to format this drive however when i go onto computer management and attemp to format, the option isn't available for this drive (c drive), meanwhile it is available for other drives including thee sdd which i haven't even used yet..:confused:

can anyone help me out, let me know where i might be going wrong?
 
You can't format the drive with the running operating system on, best bet it to install windows on the SSD and then format the other hard drive.
 
You cant format the drive while the pc is currently using it.

Do a complete reinstall of win7, then the first screen it displays will give you the option of deleting the harddrives partition/format it, then just make sure you select the SSD to do the install on.
 
I don't think you can format C: from within Windows because that's where you're running Windows from. You need to do it from the BIOS if it's an option.

If you have the retail version of Windows 7 just Boot from the CD and install it on the right disk. he format the other disk which will probably become D:.

Andi.
 
truly i am useless. right so i tried just reinstalling from the disk whilst in win 7 and on the desktop. error message. i tried booting from bios, and the only options are to start in windows 7, repair computer, safe mode etc etc. thoughts?
 
Go into your BIOS, make sure the optical drive is boot device number 1, stick the win7 disk in, just after the POST screen it will say "press a key to boot from disk" do this.

wait for it to do its thing, then you have two options to pick from, Custom or Upgrade install, pick custom, it then gives you a screen with all the disks and partitions shown, just wipe everything and start again.
 
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bios_12_big.png


anything like this in your bios, just select cd/dvd as first, hardrdive/ssd as second.
 
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would you laugh if i said i was confusing bios with boot manager? might explain a lot :)

anyway, sorry to keep pestering you with this stuff but you're a great help as are the others. i am now on the screen where i have the option to choose which disk i want to install on, as well formatting the c drive. but i was just wondering, when setting everything up would the guys at ocuk have possibly installed drivers on this disk which i would now lose? or would these have been installed elsewhere? no space is taken up on the ssd, and there is a 3rd disk called partition 1: system reserved; my guess (probably wrong) is that they would be on there? just want to be sure though..
 
you will either have to download drivers for the motherboard, graphics and sound, or was any disks supplied with the pc.
 
haha, i bet not as many times as me ;)

stulid, the pc came with the discs for my mobo and graphics cards. but the guy at ocuk said all the drivers should be installed already. you think they would have been on the c drive? obviously no harm in just putting the discs in once i finally get win7 installed on the right drive!
 
You will have to install them from the disks, as soon as you re-installed win7 they went bye bye.
 
Disconnect your other drive before installing Windows on the SSD.

If you leave it conneted some Windows files will be installed on it and then you'll mess up your installation when you format it.
 
all sorted now. thanks for all the help guys. but one final thing, i have installed all the drivers which were on my mobo disk and my graphics card disk. are these all the 'essential' drivers that i need? and where can i check that they are all installed and working properly?
 
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