How do I reformat a hard drive?

[Joe12o]

Title basically says it all, but how can I reformat my hard drive? I have an old drive that got a virus on it and I'm running out of space on my new one. So I want to take EVERYTHING off, including the OS (Got windows 7 on my new one, old one had Vista) and be able to put games/other stuff on it without having the virus on it still.

 

[swifty_morgan]

Add your HD to your current system. Boot machine. Windows should find it. Go into my computer, right click on drive and hit format. NTFS............ warning to you......... putting that drive on your machine can allow the virus to migrate.

 

[clarkjd]

1. open "computer" from Start menu.
2. Right click on the volume you want to format.
3. left click on "FORMAT" .
4. follow prompts.
Darn! a minute late!

 

[Joe12o]

Add your HD to your current system. Boot machine. Windows should find it. Go into my computer, right click on drive and hit format. NTFS............ warning to you......... putting that drive on your machine can allow the virus to migrate.

Could I start my computer in safe mode to lower the risk of the virus migrating?

 

[swifty_morgan]

TBH I never tried it that way but I would assume since less resources are available I would think so. But I never tried to format a drive in safe mode so can't be sure it would even work. But then again a hard drive formats when you put a raw drive in your machine.......... confused yet ? Give it try can't hurt.

 

[clarkjd]

Safe mode only loads a minimum number of drivers, just enough to get the PC up and running. since you are not trying to run any programs off the HDD to be formatted, I don't think you would have a problem with spreading the virus. Like swifty_morgan said:"Give it a try can't hurt."

 

[Joe12o]

Thanks for the help everyone. I formatted the drive in safe mode so does that mean I can use the drive safetly without worrying about the virus anymore?

 

[clarkjd]

Your hard drive is safe now, unless you had a virus active on the machine that did the formatting.

 

[Joe12o]

Best answer selected by joe12o.