Readers like you help support MUO. When you make a purchase using links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Read More.
I plan to do a clean install of Windows 7. Which is better and why - format the C drive or use DBAN (Darik's Boot and Nuke)? Thanks for your expertise :)
2012-08-20 12:35:59
I prefer full formating drive C
2012-08-19 13:38:25
plse help me. iam not able to install the software
2012-08-27 04:09:09
Hello, did you check that auto cad 2007 is compatible with windows 7 64 bits? If it is not, you could try installing the software as administrator or in compatibility mode.
2012-08-19 00:47:35
If the computer is yours and is in your possession and will contain more of your stuff, there is no reason to use DBAN. DBAN is to delete all data off the drive. Formatting just unallocates everything on your drive so that new data can be allocated to it. Just because the data is marked as unallocated, doesn't in any way mean that it is permanently deleted. DBAN is very useful if you plan to sell your computer (or just the hard drive), or even plan on dumping the drive in the trash. It is not very difficult to take a drive, even a format drive, and run free tools that can be found easily online to recover old data or use a regular expression to search for specific things like social security or credit card numbers. This is an example of how a person can perform data theft against you. Only if you are disposing your drive(or computer) and wish to keep it's past contents completely safe after you are done with the drive, should you use DBAN. If you want good privacy on your drive while you are still using it, you can use encryption. A program like Truecrypt would be good for this. If your drive is encrypted and you have a good password (and the password isn't in RAM) it's nearly as good as running DBAN on it, and you can consider your data safe.
2012-08-19 00:46:09
To do a clean install just backup your data and use CD to format your drive .
2012-08-18 08:15:55
Maybe not the best way, but will certainly give you a clean install would be to delete and recreate your disk partition. I've not installed Win7 from disk but have done WinXP numerous times and and during the install process it gives you the option to do this... Just make sure that you have all the files you want to keep stored somewhere nice and safe.
2012-08-17 16:41:51
Here it is in simple terms. If you have something to hide, use DBAN. If you dont then just format the drive and full format is best.
2012-08-17 14:45:55
if you have windows cd, boot on it and choose format option.
2012-08-17 14:02:45
Do a Clean Installation if:Your computer has no operating system installed, or it’s running a version of Windows prior to Windows Vista with Service Pack 1 (including Windows XP).You do NOT want to preserve your data, programs, or system drivers.You want to delete your current operating system and replace it with Windows 7.You want to create a multiboot system by installing Windows 7 on a separate hard disk partition. Use below link:http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/1649-clean-install-windows-7-a.html
2012-08-17 12:45:20
If you have a bootable disk of windows 7, then using it to delete the partition and then creating a new one, and then installing the OS on it, is pretty straightforward. A bootable disk would be the original microsoft windows installation dvd you might have purchased or received with your computer. This is different from a restore disk.
2012-08-17 12:44:37
Why do you use DBAN, afraid that the CIA will restore your previous files?For a clean install using a quick (or full) format (and no one will restore what the new installation overwrites).
2012-08-17 12:40:37
Since you are reusing your hard drive, simply reformatting during the installation process should be sufficient and does not take anywhere near as long as running DBAN on the drive first. The only possible reason I can see for using DBAN on the drive in this case is if you know that there was a boot sector virus or rootkit on the system already and even in that instance, it really wouldn't matter much as a clean install of Win7 requires that you boot from the DVD so the malware wouldn't even have a chance to go active & keep itself alive during the process anyway. The Win7 will rewrite the boot sector and the MFT completely during installation which would wipe out any boot sector virus or rootkit present. So if you don't mind wasting your time waiting for DBAN to finish, you can use it, but it won't be providing any major benefit.
2012-08-17 12:39:54
DBAN only deletes the blocks containing data. If you want a clean drive where no previous data can be restored from go ahead using it.You'd still have to – or at least should – perform a format C during installation so Windows 7 can properly setup the boot and Bitlocker partition ("System Reserved") and the one where it is going to be installed to.