Help format Laptop

jaqian

I need to format my laptop, I've had it a few years now and need to give it a spring clean.

The laptop has a windows XP Home license sticker but I've no disc to format it with as it never came with one. I do have a drivers disc if I ever get it formatted.

Is there a disc I can get that will allow me to format the laptop using my existing liscense?

Cheers,
rob

Ruu_Old

There should be something available on bootdisk.com that you can make up.

kaimera

jaqian wrote: »

I need to format my laptop, I've had it a few years now and need to give it a spring clean.

The laptop has a windows XP Home license sticker but I've no disc to format it with as it never came with one. I do have a drivers disc if I ever get it formatted.

Is there a disc I can get that will allow me to format the laptop using my existing liscense?

Cheers,
rob

Well if you dont have a disk to format the drive, how do you expect to to re.install windows?

A driver disk is useless on it's own. A recovery disk is useless also if you format the entire drive.

jaqian

kaimera wrote: »

Well if you dont have a disk to format the drive, how do you expect to to re.install windows?

A driver disk is useless on it's own. A recovery disk is useless also if you format the entire drive.

Thats i'm looking for a windows disk that will accept my laptops license. Anyone knnow where I can get one?

sebastianlieken

...youre soooo gonna get smbody banned...:rolleyes:

Overheal

Is it an OEM or a full license?

an OEM: contact your laptop vendor/check their site. Full license check microsoft.

xsiborg

before you go formatting, is there any chance that theres a separate partition on the hard drive? this may be a recovery partition, in which case you do not need a re-install cd, what manufacturer is the laptop?

coldfire1x

Borrow a copy of Xp Home from someone you know. You have the serial on your sitcker. After installation use it when you register. That way you will still have your own legal copy.

MarkR

Who is your laptops manufacturer?

RobbieMc

Jaysus, why make life complicated.

The main manufactors gave user the chance to make a COPY of the operating system by running a program on the hard drive that would burn the image to a disk. This would then allow the user to re-install the original OS back onto the laptop.
NEC gave you a seperate hidden partition and a small application that when ran would restore from the hidden partition your laptop back to the factory state.

The old saying RTFM comes to mind.
DO not BORROW someone elses CD of the OS as you may end up in a world of hurt with drivers and such( and yes I know he has a drivers disk) as the version of windows may not be laptop compatible or may have been for say a Dell of tosh laptop.

So, 1) read your manual or the website that supports your laptop.
2) follow the instructions
3) happy landings

Gone
:cool:

Sherifu

Don't suppose it has a recovery partition?

jaqian

Its a Patriot 3005 and I can't seem to find a manufactures website. The isn't any manual, so RTFM doesn't apply. It is supposed to have a partition with XP installed but this no longer works if it ever did.

I'm not looking to get anyone banned. It has a license all I need is to borrow a winXP Home disc to reinstall it using my license code but don't know anyone with a XP Home disc.

If I took it to a pc repair shop and got them to format, re-install the OS, how much am I looking at?

Agent Smith

Minimun 70.

thats A Price I was Quoted when doing research to do a reinstall for a nixer i had.

MarkR

jaqian wrote: »

Its a Patriot 3005 and I can't seem to find a manufactures website. The isn't any manual, so RTFM doesn't apply. It is supposed to have a partition with XP installed but this no longer works if it ever did.

I'm not looking to get anyone banned. It has a license all I need is to borrow a winXP Home disc to reinstall it using my license code but don't know anyone with a XP Home disc.

If I took it to a pc repair shop and got them to format, re-install the OS, how much am I looking at?

Before you go off borrowing cd's, are you sure the recovery partition / program isn't working? It may not be obvious how to use it, for example you may need to press F10 on boot (or another key), to boot from that partition. Of course if that partition has been deleted it's a different matter. Can you give us a bit more info on your computer, I've never come across a Patriot branded laptop.

jaqian

agent smith wrote: »

Minimun 70.

thats A Price I was Quoted when doing research to do a reinstall for a nixer i had.

Cheers. Thats what guessed it would be.

MarkR wrote: »

Before you go off borrowing cd's, are you sure the recovery partition / program isn't working? It may not be obvious how to use it, for example you may need to press F10 on boot (or another key), to boot from that partition. Of course if that partition has been deleted it's a different matter. Can you give us a bit more info on your computer, I've never come across a Patriot branded laptop.

Yeah I'm sure. I messed around with Linux on the laptop before I knew anything about a recovery partition (like I said there was no manual or info with latop) and it is decidely gone now.

The make/model is a Patriot 3005 and it uses a VIA 1.2Ghz Nehemiah (guessing the spelling here) processor. If I had a windows home xp disc i could do the whole format/reinstall thing myself.

Next time I buy a pc or laptop I'll make sure I have an OS disc for reinstalling.

The gas thing is I can get my hands on a cracked XP Pro disc if I want but as I have a license I'd like to use it.

Sherifu

jaqian wrote: »

The gas thing is I can get my hands on a cracked XP Pro disc if I want but as I have a license I'd like to use it.

*covers ears* la la la la la la