Driver

The reformatting will remove the currently loaded driver. To reload it you should copy the driver, or the driver set up file to another drive or floppy to load from later.

Personally, I just note what the system is, reformat the drive. Go online and find the latest driver for that audio card/chip to suit my operating system and then load that on as per the instructions on the web site. This way you get the latest drivers and capabilities and dont have to worry about keeping the current version.

PS I usually do the search and not the URL for the new driver before reformatting just to ensure that a new one is available before killing the old driver.

If possible, run Belarc Advisor or a similar system information utility before you re-format your hard drive.
www.belarc.com click on the free software link.

Belarc will give you a detailed list of your system hardware and software configuration.

Then, it should be fairly easy to identify your sound card or sound processor and download the driver.
A good source of links to manufactures drivers is www.driverguide.com

Or, you can give a driver backup utility a try.

http://www.jermar.com/wdrvbck.htm

I have not used it myself, but the author wrote it for backing up device drivers.

When you get Windows re-installed, install drivers in the following order:

System / chip-set drivers for the motherboard
DirectX (from Microsoft, make sure that you do not install a newer version than the driver for your video card supports)
Video card driver
Sound and other devices.

Chas