formatting for dummies (mainly me )

[xierra]

Hi there guys!

I am just about to reformat my computer, I have backed up all sufficient stuff I wanna keep but my main question is about the drivers..
I dont have any disks for my sound and video card etc but obviously still need the drivers after I reformat. What is the best way to find and install the neccessary drivers, do I need to find these before I reformat, I really dont know how to go about it so any help would be greatly appreciated :)

[awaj]

Welcome to http://pcguide.com/ubb/pcgubb.gif
The manufacturer's site is often the best way. What kind of computer are you reformatting? People here are willing to help you find the drivers if you need it.

[xierra]

thing is, i really dont know ANYTHING about this lol. Im reformatting my desktop computer running XP. I was looking at downloading Driver detective, which says that it finds all drivers and installs them for u etc, is this a good way to go?? This lista all drivers needed so should I just write them down and install them after the format??

[awaj]

I am not sure, but I would not go down that road unless you have a manufacturer like Acer. (the same brand as my laptop, whose website was really horrible the first time I had to install the drivers...) Most manufacturers have the drivers for download. My understanding is that the manufacturers are supposed to have those for download. What brand, and model number is your computer?

[xierra]

as far as i can tell its an intel 32 (if that means anything to u??). I have a radeon 9600 series graphics and nvidiaCK8S if that means anything to u?? It seems to be a custom built pc, not in its original casing and im not sure where to find the model number etc.

[Sylvander]

Windriver Expert - FREE (http://www.zhangduo.com/driverbackup.html) [at bottom of the linked page - as in screenshot] can/will make a backup of ALL your presently installed drivers, each to its own descriptively named folder.
You could store those in any location that Windows could access.
A USB Flash Drive would be good, but there's a possibility that USB connectivity might not function, so even better is to store them on a partition [on the internal HDD] other than the Windows Partition [C:?].
Are there partitions other than C: on the HDD?
Copy them there BEFORE you reformat C:.
Don't reformat the partition that is holding the driver files.
Perhaps make copies to more than one location [just in case you eliminate one set].

Upon reinstallation of the OS, Windows would need to be functioning normally and you could then use "Update Driver" [for any problem device] and point the driver wizard at the inf file for the driver.
.

[awaj]

I thought XP had drivers for flash drives, and CD drives too. Why are you reformatting your computer?

[giggLiden]

In addition to the expert advice offered above, I'd like to provide a gem of a program ... double-gem because it's free - that will come in very handy for you some day.

It's called ... DBAN ... described below in a google'd entry:
"Darik's Boot and Nuke (commonly known as DBAN) is an open source project hosted on Sourceforge. The program is designed to securely erase a hard disk until ...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darik's_Boot_and_Nuke - 24k - Cached - Similar pages"

Download it, run it, then HIDE the little floppy disk "self-starter" you will create so it can never be lost. It's a godsend!

It totally wipes the hard-drive clean; removes even the little stump that FDISK does not erase, the code that makes it impossible to go backwards from WIN XP to WIN98. Your h-d will be in the same condition it was when you bought it, new.

[gig]

[giggLiden]

One other thought occurs to me:
http://driverguide.com/

They have always had a driver I needed (knock wood).
Even companies I never heard of.

First approach is, of course, the manufacturer of the equipment. But it's not unsual to be looking for a model which the mfr doesn't even support any more. Driverguide will fish you out.

Every driver I have ever down-loaded has been saved to the C: drive, under "Drivers," with subheadings for each company. I save them all out to a rewritable CD, so I never to go through the agony of finding them ... again.

(Don't tell anybody; I make two CDs. I'm the cautious astronaut type.)

[gig]

[xierra]

hey thanks for all the advice! Can you believe i searched everywhere for the answers in plain english and they were really hard to come by, all in dribs and drabs.

Anywho, I am gonna try dban, i have a c and d harddrive so I can back up my stuff on one drive and dban the other, copy it to the other and dban the next one etc. I also backed up my drivers just in case it doesnt work. Wish me luck haha, I may need it :)

[PrntRhd]

Just understand you must disconnect the other drives when doing DBan. It will wipe all the drives it can find.