How to reformat sata hdd

Vwey

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Mar 6, 2014
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Recently i built a new computer and I have three HDD i want to use on it. 2 sata and 1 IDE hdd. I have window xp installed on the IDE HDD, but i want window 7 and I don't want to reformat the IDE hdd.

I have a old sata hdd that i pulled from a old computer and want to make use of it so I want to reformat it to install window 7 on it, but the BIOS and window xp cd does not detect any hdd.

When I boot up the system, on the 120gb sata hdd that i want to reformat, and go into disk manager I have 3 partitions. I deleted one logical drive but I have two remaining and it does not give me the option to reformat or delete. Need advice.

My goal is with these 3 hdd:
I want to make the 120gb sata installed window 7 OS on it and make that my main
keep the IDE with window xp OS installed as storage
use 2tb as storage
 
Solution
Sounds like you need to wipe (not merely format) the 120 GB drive. For that, use a program like Killdisk (get the bootable image from their website, burn a disk with it and then boot from it). Select the correct HDD (the root of it, not just one partition) and wipe it.
Then proceed with the clean OS install (it should ask you to format the HDD during the installation).
I would add, using old HDDs for OS installation is just asking for trouble not too far into the future. Since they have mechanical components they're prone to failure after a few years (5, on average). Unless you're just playing around with that system and are willing to do HDD replacements soon, I would say use a good HDD for the OS.
 
Sounds like you need to wipe (not merely format) the 120 GB drive. For that, use a program like Killdisk (get the bootable image from their website, burn a disk with it and then boot from it). Select the correct HDD (the root of it, not just one partition) and wipe it.
Then proceed with the clean OS install (it should ask you to format the HDD during the installation).
 
Solution