Thursday 12 May 2011

How To Reset a Computer's Hard Drive

Computers continue to slow down as they get older. Soon, the hard drive will be clogged enough to drive you mad. Deleting files, doing a disk clean up, defragmenting the drive, and running an effective anti-virus application are not anymore enough to at least keep it functional. Your last resort is to reset the hard drive. Doing so is as simple as clicking the appropriate command and having enough patience. However, doing it the wrong way will cause deleting of all the files in the hard drive. Better follow the steps below on how to properly reset a computer’s hard drive:

* Back-up hard drive files. Copy and then paste all the files from the hard drive. Do not use the back-up application or removing viruses will be impossible without damaging the safe files. Use any storage device for backing up the files as long as it is big enough for all the files. Don’t worry if there are viruses. Deal with them later.
* Check the needed drivers. All of them must be available before resetting the hard drive. Check the drive’s configuration and then compile its needed drivers. If some drivers are missing, you can download copies from the Net.
* Decide on the formatting and set the boot device. Format these partitions individually and manually. Do not format the C drive because this is usually where the important applications needed to normally run the machine are saved. There is the quick format option, which as the name suggests will quickly format the drive. Do not use this, though, because this will erase even the important applications. Instead, restart the computer. Press the Del key when the computer tells it is needed to renter the BIOS. Set the CD/DVD drive as the primary boot device.
* Insert the installation CD. Do not be tempted to change other settings especially if you don’t know the effect of each change. Just do what you need to do. Insert the Windows installation disk and choose “Save and Exit.” The computer will restart and then it will load the installation CD. Press any key if the computer asks you to do it so the process can be started.
* Format. Wait until the computer asks you to choose the partition and where to install the Windows. You may choose C and then choose “format using NTFS” if using Windows XP. Choose C and then click the advanced options if using Windows Vista and more advanced operating systems. Choose the disk’s partition to be formatted. This step also allows you to repartition the hard drive.
* Finish the installation process. Enter the username and password as well as the serial key if asked by the computer. Install also all the applications and drivers that are needed to normally run the computer.
* Eliminate malwares. Install an effective anti-virus application and then connect the device where you have copied the files. Scan this device for any malware threats and then copy the files to the hard drive.


You have finally reset the computer’s hard drive. Do as you please with this faster machine. You might need to reset the hard drive again after intensive use of the computer. For now, stick to the important maintenance techniques to keep the hard drive and the overall computer system to their best performance.

No comments:

Post a Comment