format windos xp professional

[tutuco21]

i have windows xp and want to format my hd

the problem is that i dont find a comand prompt

like in win 98

help me to format my windows xp cpu

[Andrew]

Please state your computer specs. If it is a HP computer it is possible that no CD came with it and there is a utilty you hvae to open that will format or install windows.

[Timenn]

You can find the command prompt here in Win XP Professional:

C:WINDOWSSYSTEM32cmd.exe

[Cyborg]

hehe, you silly Timenn...  :P

It has nothing to do with command prompt.

You are never allowed to format the disk the current used system is running on.

You would be formatting the program that formatted and such...

However, what you do is:

If you plan to just reinstall Windows on the same disk again, please just insert the XP cd and boot with that. It will let you format your disk for the new install.

The other method is making a boot floppy diskette with fdisk on it.

fdisk is a very good partition editor. You can delete and make new partitions in it.

The only bad thing with it is that you cannot format your disks using the NTFS file system. Only FAT32.

However windows xp installer will recognize your partitions and just reformat the disk using NTFS. Choose the fast format in that case, as it will only take a few seconds then.

PS:

Hehe, I almost forgot!

Windows XP installer also lets you delete and create new partitions.

I only use that nowadays. Fdisk is taking more time...