Formatting my hard drive

[ilovecuttingyews]

Hey, so recently I've run out of space on my laptop's hard drive. I deleted all of the unneccesary movies / music / programs I could think of, but it still runs like crap and is badly fragmented (iirc it was at 31% fragmentation before defraggler got it down to 14%) so I've decided to format my HD and go back to a clean computer.

 

I did not receive a Vista disc when I bought my computer, so I'm a little confused. Is this a good enough guide on how to do it? I've looked all over the internet and everyone seems to say something different and it's hard to tell what's right for me.

 

After I format, will I have to re-enter my Microsoft Vista Licence? The only place this was written down was on the sticker on the bottom of my laptop which conveniently is worn off so I don't have the code anymore.

Found it in my system settings

 

If it matters, I have a Toshiba Satellite A350 running Windows Vista 64-Bit. Here's a pic that I took, I'm also wondering why my HD is split into different partitions (especially the ones that I can't access).

 

So if anyone with knowledge in this can give me some pointers, tips, or a better guide (if the vid I posted is no good) that would be great. And yes, I have backed up all of my files on my external HD.

 

Thanks.

[Askthedude]

First you want to go into the bios and change your boot order so that your laptop tries to boot from a CD before the hard drive.

1. 
    
   
2. Turn off the Toshiba Satellite laptop. Turn it back on immediately and wait for the "press the F2 key to enter Setup" entry to show up on the screen.
   
3. Press the "F2" key to access the Toshiba Satellite's BIOS menu. Use the right arrow key to navigate to the BIOS tab labeled "Boot."
   
4. Scroll down to the option labeled "Boot Priority" and tap Enter. Check through the list of devices and locate the specific device you want to use to Boot your Toshiba laptop, such as "CD-ROM," "USB" or "LAN."
   
5. Highlight the name of the device in the list and then tap Enter to make it the top boot priority. Use the right arrow key again to scroll over to the "Exit" BIOS menu.
   
6. Tap the down arrow key to highlight the "Save and Exit" option. Press Enter to save the new boot order and restart your Toshiba Satellite laptop.
   
7. Repeat the procedure when you want to change the boot order back to its original setting.
    
   

 

Then it's just a simple matter of sticking in the CD and restarting. It should boot from the CD and then you just follow the on screen instructions.

 

Remember to do the last step after you finish reinstalling!

[ilovecuttingyews]

I did not receive a Vista disc when I bought my computer, so I'm a little confused.

 

As I said, I never received a disc with my laptop. Would I be able to make a disc with the 'Recovery Disc Creator'? Or is that something completely different?

[Ember]

.

[Sbrideau]

Usually you should be able to get to the recovery by using F12 or another button. You will then have the option to format before installing, which you have to choose instead of the option that keeps the files.