# How to reformat a Netbook? (Dell Mini 10v)



## fattty

Hey guys, 
I have a Dell Mini 10v netbook that I am looking to sell. I put it up for auction on eBay which ends in about 30 hours. Before I ship it off, How do I reformat it and ERASE ALL information on it and return it to the factory windows xp?

Thanks!
-Tim


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## johnb35

You should have gotten a reinstallation cd when you bought it.  You boot to it, format the drive and reinstall windows.  Oh, wait, you said netbook, most likely you have a recovery partition.  Look in your manual on how to reinstall windows.


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## tremmor

i got in the mail yesterday for my birthday today. it was an Asus Eee and surprised it had a installation cd for windows home and all the drivers.


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## fattty

I have the CD's, but no cd drive or external drive. Could you give me more details about the recovery partition? 
I will look for the manual when i have time. Thanks!


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## tremmor

you can goto explorer and look for another partition like c: and d:. If you right click the drive and look at the properties you will see the size of the drive. example is mine says 157 gig. Yes its a 160 gig and no partition. Yesterday i also bought a slim dvd burner. not to many ways around it. if ya have the recovery disc and drivers i doubt its also on a partition.


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## fattty

I only have one drive which is C: Named OS, so i'm guessing there isn't a recovery partition?


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## tremmor

they had some readers only and not slim line. Not a biggie. just what ya need for something like $39.00 as an external. reader only.
might have been office depot or bestbuy. don't remember. will i use a netbook for burning. No......i don't think.  One thing i liked it got the power from usb. no power supply and worked fine. only criteria was it had to be minimum of usb2. did require the power supply or at least suggested for my netbook. worked well but only 8 speed. No biggie.
cheers.....

even supported writing light scribe. 
kind of useless though.


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## fattty

So right now, no other way than to get an external drive? How about booting to flash drive, or even easier, 
How dangerous would it be if i uninstalled all programs and deleted all files that i have?


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## tremmor

Im not sure cause i never had a laptop long enough to try a wipe and install with usb. my kids always got the laptop 1st. I suspect by morning someone will reply. Im only guessing. Lots of boot devices for usb support in dos mode. Maybe an operating system on the usb could be slipstreamed. interesting though. we will see who replies. You did say you had to wipe and reinstall the operating wiped clean before selling. i will watch who replies. 

I would think a boot device that would initiate the usb would be good. and the operating system was installed on the usb device. Just a copy of the cd to the usb and boot from there.  its just another drive. Im just guessing though. never tried it. have towers only now and a netbook.


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## PCwhoop

try the following: first  the F8 key to get into the starting advanced options, and choose the option (Repair the system)  to get into the program that recover the complete system to the factory initial configurations.  It works with dell laptops,


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## fattty

I pressed f8, nothing happened. Neither did pressing any other f(x) button work. It just went straight to the xp loading screen. o.0? I need to ship out my netbook by tuesday afternoon at the latest so I am in desperate need of reformating!


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## FunnelWeb

Try Fn + F11 immediately after you start the laptop.

or after the post right before the OS starts loading there is a screen with a blue bar at the top you can push ctrl+f11 to get the restore to launch

hope this helps


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## fattty

No blue bar. All i see is a circle with dell for about .5 seconds and bottom right corner says f2 setup and f11 or f12 something else. I press all the combinations of ctrl, fn, and f(x) i can, but still nothing happens. D:


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## voyagerfan99

I imagine that since it's a netbook it has XP. If so, follow this guide to install windows with a Flashdrive.

P.S. Use a computer with a CD-ROM to create the flash drive.

http://www.pctipsbox.com/installing-windows-xp-using-a-usb-flash-drive/


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## fattty

I was thinking, since i haven't put in credit card numbers on this netbook, could i just right click the C: drive and click format?
What does this erase?
Will all installed programs still be there?
Will someone be able to retrieve passwords, etc.
How safe is this?
What other way can i wipe my hard drive clean instead of reformating?


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## johnb35

You can't format your windows drive while inside windows, it won't let you.  To be sure everything is off the hard drive you would have to reformat.


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## fattty

So right clicking and pressing format wont do anything?


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## johnb35

Nope. Windows won't format itself.


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## fattty

If i uninstall and delete everything, would that be safe enough?
im too nooby for those usb guides.


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## johnb35

Do you have anything really personal on there?


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## fattty

Hmm.. not really. just some pictures, school stuff. My main concern is that they somehow get my passwords, and other things i entered online. My parents have gone on paypal and ebay and I don't want their accounts to be stolen if that is even possible. Also,  I have made lots of tweaks and lots of modifications. (like right now my windows xp looks like windows 7, custom fonts, sounds, and all that) I just want it wiped clean so it is back to what it was when i first got it so the buyer has no problems.

If there is a program that can delete my files, then that would be great because I have about 70 gigabytes of files on there and tons of programs that would take ages to uninstall and delete one by one. 

Thanks again for putting up with my noobiness guys!


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## johnb35

You will need to find a way to format and reinstall windows.  Look in your manual on how to reinstall windows.


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## Drenlin

fattty said:


> I was thinking, since i haven't put in credit card numbers on this netbook, could i just right click the C: drive and click format?



Nope, like JohnB said, Windows won't do that. Actually, as far as I know, no OS will...that's the digital equivalent of trying to eat your own head. 

What you CAN do, if you have a desktop, is put the hard drive in there and format it, but that'll erase windows for good. Try this first:

When you turn the netbook on, immediately keep tapping F8. It should take you to a menu with a few options on how to boot windows. There should be a "repair your computer" option. Using that, there should be a way to restore your computer to factory settings.


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## dannaswolcott

tremmor said:


> i got in the mail yesterday for my birthday today. it was an Asus Eee and surprised it had a installation cd for windows home and all the drivers.



Got the same netbook, I love it best ever...


You may have to create an USB bootable installer in order to reformat and install windows. I am not sure if dell has a recovery partition since I dont work on dells often, But If I can remanmber last the new dell netbooks have the recovery partition in them.


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## Drenlin

Just looked it up. It's not F8. On mini 10's with a recovery partition, you hit CTRL + F11 as the BIOS loads. Apparently, not all of them have one....good luck.


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## fattty

Drenlin said:


> When you turn the netbook on, immediately keep tapping F8. It should take you to a menu with a few options on how to boot windows. There should be a "repair your computer" option. Using that, there should be a way to restore your computer to factory settings.



I got into bios and under the boot menu it only says Hard drive, cd/dvd drive, etc. Nothing about resotring or repairing. I will take a picture to show you guys after school!

Thanks for putting up with me again!!!


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## natashamartin

If you are using a Dell notebook, I think there is a way to do a PC restore which will allow you to go back to its factory settings. You just need to follow the instructions carefully as it appeared on their guide. I found this information online & I hope it helps you.

http://support.dell.com/support/topics/global.aspx/support/dsn/document?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs&docid=3E48AE3870775D64E040A68F5B2877D4&journalid=82C256FC73DE4BE3E040AC0A66E91DEB&Query=&SystemID=&ServiceTag=&contenttype=&os=&component=&lang=&doclang=&toggle=&dl=


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## Drenlin

fattty said:


> I got into bios and under the boot menu it only says Hard drive, cd/dvd drive, etc. Nothing about resotring or repairing. I will take a picture to show you guys after school!
> 
> Thanks for putting up with me again!!!



I was wrong, it's not F8 on these. Normally, you'd use the process that natashamartin posted, but from what I've read, the newer models are different. Try CTRL + F12 instead of F8?


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## fattty

natashamartin said:


> If you are using a Dell notebook, I think there is a way to do a PC restore which will allow you to go back to its factory settings. You just need to follow the instructions carefully as it appeared on their guide. I found this information online & I hope it helps you.
> 
> http://support.dell.com/support/topics/global.aspx/support/dsn/document?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs&docid=3E48AE3870775D64E040A68F5B2877D4&journalid=82C256FC73DE4BE3E040AC0A66E91DEB&Query=&SystemID=&ServiceTag=&contenttype=&os=&component=&lang=&doclang=&toggle=&dl=



Thanks for this, but i think t hat is for vista or windows 7. 

...Anyways, the problem is fixed. I deleted everything from my hard drive, uninstalled like 99% of programs, deleted some unecessary folders in Appdata etc, used ccleaner and another program to wipe free disk space. 
I should be good, but if not, there is nothing to do about it. I just shipped it out today. Now onto finding a laptop to buy!!! p.s. Thanks everyone!!


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