Reformatting Windows..

[BahnE30]

deleting the partition will wipe the entire drive and save nothing, so it will be a fresh system running XP

good luck

[Nathan]

You don't have to actually delete the partition you just need to make sure that when it asks you to format the partition you chose "Format NTFS" no the quick format or whatever else. The default option is just to install over without a format which is probably what you did. What the other people have said will definetly work, but it is also slightly more dangerous for an inexperience user to be deleting and recreating partitions.

[Stu]

I deleted the partition and created a new one, following the instructions on-screen. It worked, as far as I know. I've just installed the drivers, ran the Windows Updates, and downloaded Ad-aware. I'm going to get Symantec anti-virus this afternoon.

Thanks for everyones help, this wasn't as hard as I thought. ;)

[BahnE30]

people who pay someone to work on there computers have no idea how simple things like this are, and even if you fuck it over a shop will be able to fix it in about 38 seconds. most of those guys can do shit like that with their eyes closed.