accessing my partitioned drive

[krofts5]

when i purchased my computer, circuit city apparently partitioned my hard drive. my HD, was 350 gigs, but they took a 9 gig piece, an placed my recovery stuff on it, instead of giving me a recovery or win vista disk. my main disk is designated C:. the partition is D:. i need to format my C:, but can't, because it says drive is in use. how do i boot up into D:, so that i can format my C:, and then move my recovery stuff from D: to C:

[Salmon Trout]

Why don't you just perform a recovery operation?

[krofts5]

because my recovery cd is on the partitioned part of my hard drive, circuit city never gave me a restore cd or a win cd, when i purchased the computer. i want to totally format C drive and start from scratch

[patio]

Did you try F10 at boot as i suggested ? ?

[Salmon Trout]

i want to totally format C drive and start from scratch

With what?

[jason2074]

i want to totally format C drive and start from scratch

Rule of the thumb: When purchasing or buying a computer, either laptop or desktop, always make sure that a CD installer for OS comes along. Mobo driver, graphics and video card follows.

because my recovery cd is on the partitioned part of my hard drive

What if HD is corrupted and not able to change or reinstate previous system stability?
These CD's are not only handy but are the dependents of your computer.

[Allan]

You cannot format the system partition from within the OS - you need to do it at boot.

[Salmon Trout]

how do i boot up into D:, so that i can format my C:, and then move my recovery stuff from D: to C:

You cannot boot into D: because D: does not contain a bootable operating system. There is only one of these on your computer, in the C: partition. Since you cannot format the system disk from within the system, the only way you can do this is by booting into a different operating system that has access to your hard drive. This could be (for example) the Windows Preinstall Environment (Windows PE) which is contained on every Windows install CD. Or there are other bootable CDs you can use. Or you can prepare a pen drive but that it is a bit more difficult. In any case, formatting a disk means to blank it and write a fresh (empty) file system onto it. once you have formatted the C: drive, what are you going to do next? A formatted drive contains nothing... no files, no operating system, nothing, nada, zilch, zip. Or did you think that "format" means "freshly reinstall Windows"? If you did, then performing the system restore operation using the restore partition is going to achieve that. Also, why do you think you want to "move your recovery stuff"?

[Salmon Trout]

D: does not contain a bootable operating system

It would be more accurate to say that D probably contains a bootable installation of FreeDOS which is configured to run (probably) Norton Ghost to restore a factory-fresh partition image onto the C partition.

[patio]

Obviously he did not attempt F10 as suggested...

He'll be back i predict...