Formatting new 9100?

[ride2bhi]

Received my 9100 today and was astonished at all the bloatware that Dell puts on their machines. I decided to do a clean install and upgrade to XP Pro. When I went to format the drive using FDISK, a partion came up that I've never heard of type CP/M? It is taking up about 3.5gb and I am not sure if I need it. Can anyone explain what this is and if it is important? Thanks.

[speedracer120]

That's where most manufacturers place the info to make for easier and faster system restores and installs, i.e., the OS with the unwanted bloatware. So in a sense it can be important if you don't have a different copy of Windows with you. As for removing it, there are sources around the net, but I never had any experience so might as well hang out and wait for the more informed to fill in the gaps.

[ride2bhi]

Found this on Dell's website.

LINK (http://forums.us.dell.com/supportforums/board/message?board.id=insp_harddrive&message.id=36137)

Still don't understand what the purpose of this partition is, doesn't seem like I'm losing anything but more bloatware.

Looks like it is cool to delete all the partitions on the drive.

LINK (http://forums.us.dell.com/supportforums/board/message?board.id=insp_harddrive&message.id=36025)

Going to do it tomorrow since I don't want to restore all the crap that Dell puts on these machines. If anyone has any objections, speak now or forever hold your peace...

[Jeffbx]

Blow it away. It's the same software that's on the CDs they ship with your system, anyway.

Also, don't bother with fdisk - you should be able to do all of your partitioning as part of the XP setup. You can probably remove the 'restore' partition from there as well.

[bachviet]

I think it's a backup partition and you don't need it. I had reinstalled OS on 3 of my Dell machines and I always deleted those partitions.

[iowapilot]

Make sure you have restore CDs handy or other drivers available, though. I dont know for sure on the Dell's, but I had a problem with this on my old Vaio when installing a retail copy of XP. Drivers that were proprietary to Sony weren't available anywhere but restore CDs or the restore partition. Ended up costing me $20 for the restore DVD's just to get my F keys and touchpad to work.

[DarkFury]

One question though...

Why are you doing a FDISK to install WinXP Pro?

WinXP can delete and create all the partitions that it needs... and if it needs the Win98 or ME confirmation for the "upgrade" then it will just ask you for it when you begin the install.

Honestly, there really is no need to do an FDISK if you are doing a complete re-install. :D

[ride2bhi]

Guess I am a creature of habit. Got accustomed to using an old Win98 disk to do my formatting. I will use the XP disk this time. Thanks for all the tips and advice. Time to eliminate some bloatware...