Help with Reinstalling XP Pro

[ihocky02]

I had to reinstall XP Pro this week. The drive had originally been made into 2 paritions with the C: being about 4.5 gb. This size caused me problems with running out of memory. When I went through the partitioning setup I could not delete or change the size of the C: partition. So I left it as it was and broke the rest of the HD into 3 partitions. I used one of the new partitions to load Windows onto. I now have 2 copies of windows loaded onto the system. I want to erase to original copy that was causing problems. I tried to format the C drive and it said I could not format the system partition even though I was running off of the newer install and drive. How would I remove the old OS or format the C drive. Would it be easier to go through the setup and delete all of the partitions and let windows load, and then go back through and load windows again except create my partions this time. My ultimate goal is to either remove the original OS or to enlarge the C: partition and reload Windows XP onto it.

[Statica]

Since you're starting with a fresh install, my suggestion would be to go back and delete ALL the partitions and then recreate the partitions - make sure that your system drive is at least 10 GB.
To delete your partitions, read the directions carefully on how to delete, mixed in with some understanding of the physical nature of the drive.
If you have 2 partitions thus:
|<----- C --->|<--------- D -------------------------->|
Then you obviously cannot delete C and make it a larger partition till you delete out D first.

If you'd rather not install everything all over again, and youwant to live with the 4 partitions on your system then post back here and we can help you with removing just the old version of Windows XP.

[ihocky02]

I would prefer to have less partitions. When I originally went through I removed the original second partition, but could not get the c: partition to be the full disk. How would I have to go about creating 2 partions and enlarging the current c: partition. The C: is currently about 4.5 gb. and I want to enlarge it to at least 10. When I remove the other partitions will the system automatically make the C: the full size.

[Statica]

You should go through the blue stage install till you reach the partitions screen. Make sure that you select FRESH INSTALL.
You should see the list of your partitions here.
a) Starting from the bottom, select the last partition and press D to delete it (There will be one partition of 8MB that cannot be deleted, it's a system partition that comes up automatically).. read the screens carefully when deleting partitions, deleting some partitions require you to confirm the deletion by pressing L .. make sure you do so.
b) Once you have deleted all the partitions, you should just see
Unpartitioned Space ... xxxxxx MB
This will tell you that you have deleted ALL your partitions.
c) Now to create the partitions. Select the Unpartitioned space (if it's highlighted in white, it means that it's selected).. press C to create a partition.
Here, if you want to create a partition of 10GB then enter 10240 (the units are in MB here) .. if you have the space, I would go as high as 15GB (15360 MB) on this partition.
If however, you would like to create just one big partition, then make it the maximum size allowable
d) Once you've created the first partition, you will be back at the partitioning screen where you should see your C drive with the space you allocated followed by Unpartitioned Space. Select the Unpartitioned space and create another partition of the size you require. And so forth.
e) When you've finished partitioning your drive to satisfaction, use your arrow keys to highlight the first partition - C Drive and then press ENTER to begin installation. This lets the installer know that you wish to install to that particular partition
f) It is recommended that you format that partition using NTFS and not FAT.

Tips:
* You dont really need to partition your entire drive before you begin installation, you could just create a 10-15GB partition for C drive and then go about your installation and leave the rest of the space as unpartitioned. You can then partition them after your XP is working.
* Remember that the ONLY partition you cannot tweak later is your system partition or C drive. The rest of the partitions are all fair game for nuking and repartitioning/resizing. So if you make a mistake dont worry about it, as long as you have your working XP you can always repartition them within Windows.
* There are 3rd party software like Partition Magic that will let you resize partitions without formatting or losing information... however they all cost $$.

HTH

[ihocky02]

When I went through that process the first time it would not allow me to delete the C: partition. It said that I could not delete the system partition. Is there some trick to removing this partion or do I have to leave it there.

[Statica]

If you started XP install by booting from the CD, and you prompted to do a NEW installation, you should be able to delete the C Drive - you have to confirm the deletion by pressing L (the directions are on screen). There is an illustrated installation guide here: http://www.theeldergeek.com/xp_pro_i..._-_graphic.htm

If however, you find that you still cannot remove the partition after following all the directions and pressing the right keys and following on-screen prompts then obviously something may not be right. The best bet is to then, go to your hard drive manufacturer's website and download a zero fill utility. This will erase everything on your drive. You can then start XP installation afresh.

[ihocky02]

Thanks for the help. After looking through everything and going back through my process I realized that I wasn't booting off the CD. I was allowing it to start booting of the HDD and then it would run the CD. Since it was booting off the HDD it wouldn't allow me to completely clear the C: partition. I went through and booted off the CD and had absolutely no problems. Once again, thanks for the help