how ro format may drive

The specific procedure depends on the manufacture of your PC.

With some, you boot from the recovery CD and go from there.

Others, you need to boot from a recovery floppy first.

The recovery CD set 'should' restore your PC to the state it was in when you bought it.

First!!! Back up ALL critical files and settings. This includes all passwords, internet settings, and your address book.

Then, read through the PC manufactures documentation on how to restore your system.

You may want to go to their web site and get the latest instructions.

You will need to re-install ALL Windows updates, and any software that you use.

Chas

Step 1. Yes, backups as step 1. Include exporting your bookmarks.
2. Ensure that you have a driver for your network card. This is the most important one if you are on high speed Internet connection as all the other drivers are secondary as long as you can get to the internet but your network card musst either be recognized by Windows or will need its specific driver.
3. Go to your systems/network settings and write down all the different selections and protocols used including the TCPIP properties. If you copy all these down then it's a snap.
4. Next, shutdown and then take out the peripherals in your computer and carefully note down all identifying markings for netwrok card, video card as small differences often mean a different driver.
5. Step 5 involves enabling boot up off your cdrom as the default setting is usually C: then A:. In Award bios, you have to hit the "Delete" key in order to get into the bios area during the the very first screens when booting up. Most bioses have a single lineoff onscreen that tells you how to get in. Others are not as kind.
6. With the bootup enabled, the recovery cd will do the rest of the installation
7. You may end up in VGA mode but re-tyoing your network settings will get you back into the Internet from which you can get most any driver.
8. Occasionally, you may need some special driver for the motherboard which you should have got with the pc. These drivers are usually "requested " during loadup at which time, you would insert the relevant cd when prompted and point the software request to the cd rom drive.

Hope this helps.

You really need the i386 folder which may be somewhere on your hard drive. then you want to make a boot cd with a few things like smartdrive etc on it and the i386 folder.
Once you have booted you can then run i386\winnt.exe and that will start the setup process for XP.
Also make sure you have the Serial Number, which will probably be stuck on the base of your PC. And before you do all this you may want to back up the activation files so that you don't have to go through all the hassle of activating it again.