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[Switchblade]

under the advise of some friends, I've done a massive backup of all the files I want to keep from my C drive, and am about to format it.

This should hopefully clear up some massive registry problems I've been having lately.

However, before I do this,  I want to double-check as I can't remember: will formatting the drive delete ALL data on it, or merely restore it to "factory settings"? In other words, will Windows still be there after formatting, ready for me to set it up again and restore my PC to working order?

If I remember correctly, it will, but I would appreciate some confirmation of this fact before I proceed.

[Bunnyman]

Nope.  A format will wipe your disk.  What you are no doubt thinking of is a "recovery disk," which ships with any decent prebuilt system.  Make damn sure you have a Windows XP disk (and serial!) lying around before performing this action.

What kind of system?  I know ThinkPads have a 'recovery partition' that restores factory settings, but that's a laptop thing.

[Switchblade]

good job I checked, then

This PC has a secondary drive (designated D:) that contains a nice big read-only folder represented by a golden padlock, named "RECOVERY". is that the kind of thing I should be looking for?

[Bunnyman]

Very possibly.  Check the contents of said recovery disk...for example, do you boot to it and then run setup?  Is there a help file or SETUP.EXE in there somewhere?  Documentation is your friend.

[Switchblade]

when I take a closer look at it, I get a message from Compaq to the effect that the partition contains files used for system recovery.

It seems not to want me progressing beyond that point to check the actual contents. This being a Compaq machine, I think the assumption being made is that I'm an idiot who would delete system restore files.

I think I'll wait a while until I can get one of my more knowledgeable friends to have a look at it.