reformat a laptop and reinstall xp

Thanks
I will turn on the firewall which by the way i thought was turned on by default. (now realize it isn't) and i will put on a third party as well just to be sure
Wish me luck
If i get on to this site again hopefully it will be with my lap top
Stitch

 

Well here I am. On my Lap Top. My CLEAN and Pached Lap Top.
Downloading more security updates as I type this.
Thanks to everyone.
and yes Christer Practice makes perfect (i hope) though too much practice nearly ended with a broken window and a big grrrrr of frustration as laptop went through.

 

2 things to remove dual boot

1. win xp (home or pro) run msconfig -> boot.ini. If you see two lines that are exactly the same, then then deleting one of them will remove dual boot prompt at startup.
2. When you do clean reinstall of XP make sure to delete C: partition (or any other partitions). This return the HD to clean state obliterating any previus installations. Then recreate the C: Your new installation will be the only one on the HD.

If you want to make sure there is nothing left on HD use tool like KillDisk to destroy data

PS. As always do backups of important files. Download SR1a and other updates (like the one against Blaster) to CD and install them before reconnecting to the net. Blaster can find unprotected computer within minutes of connecting to the internet.

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