Wiping my hard drive completely

Yes he has the DVD for 7, but I am fairly certain that he will not be able to run his DVD with 7 over Win 10. He has to either create a partition or remove the HD with 10 on it.
You went forward, he is trying to go backward. MS allowed that when promoting 10 but you had to have 7 pre-installed, I don't think he has, don't know though.

 

Yes Bill you are correct. His laptop was installed with W10 - therefore he cannot go back to W7 as it was not previously installed. I can't see any other way than to remove the HDD and use a separate external holder as I described in my earlier Post.

 

Have you seen this, blakston6286?

How to Erase a Hidden Hard Drive Partition | Techwalla.com

It references diskpart.exe that others have pointed out, and it includes the necessary steps. I used this tool one time to remove hidden a OEM partition on a Windows 7 desktop, but the process required booting from a 2nd drive if I remember correctly.

Is there any way you can remove your laptop's drive and install it as a second drive in another computer? Seems like the only way to get at and delete hidden OEM partitions on your new drive.

 

I feel that because you have stated the above, you will need to get a friend with the ability to carry out our suggestions for you or pay a Technician to wipe the drives for you.
I can understand why some people are lacking in practical ability to get into the workings of everyday devices (my wife is one). She will pull the drawers out of the refrigerator to clean them, and then call for me to put them back. She will also take the vacuum cleaner apart to clean the filters and dust collector, then I have to re-install everything.
So if you cannot follow the suggestions - seek a friend or spend a buck.

 

I was thinking about working in a Windows environment, but you are correct about booting from a flash drive. I've done it a few times for various reasons, but it's not something I do often. I'm downloading from the link you posted out of curiosity. I'll create the required image, burn it to a flash drive, and see how things go from there. Should be interesting.

 

Correct, I saw that after exploring the zip folder. I haven't started yet, but I'll free up a flash drive ASAP and give it a go.

 

IFL had no such partition deleting tool that I could gather, so I downloaded BootIt Bare Metal to gain access to the partition tool, but my version of the product seemed to be for demo only.

I also downloaded rsinfo's tool Download GParted Live - MajorGeeks and burned it to disc. This tool reminds me of Fdisk as it is run within a DOS environment, but it allowed me to see my Toshiba Windows 7 OEM recovery partition, C drive, and another hidden partition with the option to delete all three.

Neither tool was all that difficult to work with, but BootIt Bare Metal had the most hoops to jump through. It took me a while figure them (hoops) out, but they are not as complicated as they look.

 

Who is the manufacturer of the HDD?

 

This is a very informative thread. Found some great tools and advice.

If I were blakston6286, I'd burn GParted to disc (if he hasn't already) and give it try. For what it's worth, I tried burning the tool to a USB drive with Rufus, but Rufus didn't support the GParted image - or in other words, it wasn't bootable from a flash drive.

You talking to to me, LJ?

 

I beg your pardon, GParted Live allows you to use your mouse.

Correction: I forgot to mention that I downloaded CopyWipe, too, which has since been integrated with BootIt Bare Metal. CopyWipe, itself, is not supported anymore, but it is still available (for free), and it appears to be a DOS only program.

Sorry if mislead anyone. I was up late last night when I experimented with these programs. I could access all hidden partitions with either of these tools. Anyone using CopyWipe needs to press F6 to view a given drive's partitions.

 

I would venture to say that the OP has gave up. Hasn't been here in 2 weeks.

 

Me, thinks so too. But all the same good info for someone looking into attempting something similar.

 

I agree. Would be nice it the OP came back and let us know what they did.

 

I was asking blakston6286. James who is the manufacturer of your HDD?

 

One Toshiba drive in the laptop, and I have two Seagate drives in the Dell desktop. I use the 2nd Seagate drive to store my backup images on from both machines.

 

I'll second that.

From my experience, a user can make backup discs of the pre-installed operating system just in case things don't go as planned with the Windows downgrade. I actually lost access to my Windows 7 recovery partition after partitioning C drive, but luckily that access was restored after using the set of recovery discs I made earlier.