# How to unpartition my only hard drive?



## gotcha (Oct 14, 2002)

I am not very good at technical explanations, my windows XP are on my partitioned (C The other half of the hard drive is now the (D which I have formated. All I want to do is get rid of the partition (D and do a clean Windows XP install on the unpartitioned hard drive!
I have opened up Computer Managment and found (C and (D but cannot see how to delete the (D partition and have (C back all alone, so to speak
You can see I am not very technical Ha Ha!
Cheerio and thank you.
I know some people prefer to have a split hard drive. I don't want it!


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## norton850 (Mar 9, 2004)

So you are planning to reinstall Windows?


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## ceri sheeran (Aug 15, 2003)

Hi,

Basically two options

Backup and re-install

Or use a partition Management program

Partition Magic
Paragon
Partition Logic
Acronis Disk Director.

hth

Ceri


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## maxibhoy (Jan 19, 2006)

You do not have to reinstall windows. I recommend using partition magic unless you want to format, reinstall. The choice is yours. I'm not sure if any of those mentioned prgrams however will do the job with an evaluation copy so you may have to buy one unless again you use your windows cd and format which i'm sure you'll manage without too much direction. Max.


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## gotcha (Oct 14, 2002)

I want to CLEAR everything off the computer, and do a clean install of MY WINDOWS XP PROF with NO partitioned hard drive! Cheerio and thank you.


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## Old Rich (Jan 17, 2003)

Enter BIOS ( Setup ) and set the first boot device as CD/ROM. Put your XP Disc in the drive and disconnect all external peripherals except the monitor, keyboard and mouse, and be sure those are not USB, or wireless. Any internal USB card should also be removed.

Once you set your BIOS to boot first from cd . . when it restarts you will see a black screen with a prompt "_*Press any key to boot from CD*_" . . do that and you will be able to delete any or all partitions and recreate one or more, then proceed to formating and installing XP.

That message can pass quickly, so have a finger on the keyboard when you boot. This will delete all data on the drive so be sure you have your important data backed up. The prompt will appear after every reboot, but do not press any key on subsequent reboots. The setup process will continue with no action required from you.

If you do not get that message, and you have another optical drive, try the XP CD in the other drive.


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## Old Rich (Jan 17, 2003)

This is a site that walks you thru a simulated XP installation:
http://www.echoproject.net/en/software/catalog.html

These are good guides to reinstalling XP . . you might want to print one for reference during the install.

http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/windowsxp_sg_clean.asp
http://www.socrtwo.info/cleanxpinstall.htm
http://www.theeldergeek.com/xp_home_install_-_graphic.htm


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