Over
burdened system registry, too many programs installed on a hard drive or
malicious virus infection – all these problems for a laptop can be handled with
a common defensive maneuver of reformatting your hard drives. Experts advise to
periodically format your hard drives to keep your laptop’s system healthy.
Yet,
the procedure might feel marginally difficult for those without basic technical
experience. In addition, there is the eminent threat of losing important files
saved on your hard drive, if you even miss a single step during the process.
Predictably, most laptop owners would rather reformat their systems only as a
last line of defence.
What does it mean
to format a laptop hard drive?
Formatting a laptop hard drive means
to prepare the partition on your hard drive that is used by your operating
system to run all basic processes on your laptop. Once you delete all the data
on this partition, you will set up a new file system to reconfigure the entire
working system of your laptop.
Windows uses the disk management tool or a
format command. The format command is a line of direct command that is typed in
to an interface (command prompt) and run on the system.
The hard drive may or may not be partitioned
on your laptop. This is why the process refers to formatting a hard drive even
though in some cases the formatting is only concluded on a single partition.
When do you need
to format laptop hard drive?
Formatting your hard drive would delete all
data from the drive and leave it blank. You can then reload all your important
software, applications and backed up data on to your systems.
However, if you are not diligent in backing
up or do not own the installation files of certain software applications you
will lose them forever. Here are a few instances when formatting is essential.
If you have a black screen, your system will
not boot, or the system restarts every time you boot up but would not go beyond
the DOS screen – formatting is your only option to start your system again.
After a long time of usage, without proper
maintenance, you might run out of hard disk space to save more files.
Formatting will help clean out unwanted files, temporary files that are hard to
find, and corrupted files all at one go. You can reinstall the data that you
essentially need.
Virus corrupted files will reduce the
efficiency of your system. It is faster and safer to format your hard drive
within an hour than to waste days over fixing every error manually.
You might also want to format if you intend
to upgrade your existing operating system. If your laptop has an outdated
operating system and you want to upgrade the settings to the latest version of
the software, full formatting is your only logical option.
Finally, if your laptop is running at a
sluggish pace, you can use formatting to boost
its speed performance. However, sometimes the issue might be with
the hardware, so check if that is not the problem with your situation.
What you will need
To successfully format your laptop hard drive
you will need –
·
Laptop/pc
·
Drivers on your device
·
Operating system CD for installation
·
Software CDs for re-installation
after formatting
·
Back-up storage medium
Step 1
Make sure all essential files on your laptop
hard drive are backed up on the back up storage medium. These can be external
hard drives, DVDs or Flash drives.
Step 2
Check if you have all your device drivers
before starting installation. If your laptop came with an original operating
system installation, either you must have the installation CD or you have to
burn it before hand from an existing partition on your laptop.
Step 3
You should have a utility or CD burning
software on your laptop, which will allow you to burn the operating system
installation files from your hidden hard drive partition on to a CD. You can
confirm the existence of the files by either pressing F8 or F10 when starting
up your computer.
Step 4
Check if all essential software installation
files are saved on an alternate storage medium. When downloading any software
from the internet ensure that you have backed up the installation files on an
outside medium.
Step 5
Insert the operating system installation CD
in the DVD or CD drive on your laptop. Now boot up the computer. F you are
directly formatting from the hidden partition available on your laptop, start
up your system, and then press the shortcut keys F8 or F10. Now follow the
instructions that come up on the screen.
Step 6
You should do a full system recovery and
install the Windows operating system to complete re-formatting your laptop.
Step 7
Install an antivirus program on the laptop.
You should also check and adjust firewall settings to reinforce your computer’s
security system.
Step 8
Connect the backup storage media to the
laptop and transfer all essential files back on to the system. You should
re-install functional software that is most essential for your work. This
conclusively completes full formatting of your windows laptop
No comments: