What is the best way to restore your computer back to its factory settings?

My computer is running very slow and I think it is infected with viruses.


The operating system I have is Windows XP Home Edition.


The Anti Spyware is Pc Guard.





How could you wipe everything off your computer and basically start from scratch again.





Any help would be very welcome

What is the best way to restore your computer back to its factory settings?
hi andy


the simple answer to this mate is to use the recovery disk that came with your p.c


this should of been bundled with your software that came with your p.c and is normally easy to miss as it only comes in a plain white sleeve


basically though andy the recovery disk is a windows xp disk specificly produced for your p.c,it cannot be used on any other p.c as it contains software and drivers unique to your p.c


however andy,some p.c,s have a recovery partition instead of a recovery disk,to find out if you have this instead of a disk restart your p.c and just when the bios screen appears(when you see the hard drives and cd roms installed on your p.c) look at the bottom of the screen and it will have press delete for set up and next to it it will say press f11 or f12 for recovery options(or something like that)


if you have the disk then simply insert it into your dvd drive and restart your p.c,then when the p.c starts press delete to enter the bios and go into advanced bios features and set cd rom as the first boot device(hdd1 second and floppy third)


then go back to them main bios screen and press "save and exit set up" to save changes to cmos,the p.c will now restart


once the p.c starts up again you will be asked to "press any key to boot from cd",this will start windows xp installing on your p.c,then just follow the on screen prompts(have your windows product key ready%26lt;you will find this on the side of your p.c)


in the case of the recovery partition just follow the prompts as they appear,its easy to use and has the added advantage over the disk of being able to save your data


both these methods will return your p.c to its factory state,or the way it was when you first took it out of the box


any problems let me know


good luck andy !
Reply:Use your system recovery cd's
Reply:Forget the advice of the Seventh and Eighth answers as they are nonsense. Take the advice of the first answer and follow the onscreen instructions. When you are re-installing at some point you will be prompted to register NOW or LATER. Put a checkmark in the box entitled Register Later. If, the Operating System is pre-installed then Reboot and as it is rebooting one of the following combinations will need to be used.Press F10 and ALT together. Press F11. Press F11 and CTRL together
Reply:Depends what type it is.If you have Acer.On start up you press


ALT+F10.It may take a few attempts to do it.But it works.If not


you will have to contact the maker to find out.


Don't do the above.It will corrupt your hard drive.


Source-----Experience.
Reply:Most PCs come with a recovery disk. If not call your manufacturer. It will walk you through the setup of reinstalling everything.





But be advised, you will lose everything. Any music, documents, pictures, etc. You will erase everything. If you need to keep something you should back it up first.
Reply:mail me biltom6601@yahoo.com there is a tool from a site called disk wipe which wipes your pc clean.


mail me and i tell how to get this tool if you cant find it.
Reply:put all the stuff you still want like pictures, word documents etc. on a disk.





then you should have a recovery disk, just put it in and if should run.





if not when starting you the computer press either F4 or F7 if they don't work it depends what computer you ahave so you'd have to phone up the company.





hope that helps.
Reply:if you go into your start menu go on all programs then into accessories, them on to system tool and you will find system restor then you just follow the steps and chose you reset date.
Reply:if your not good with computers, the answer is you cant
Reply:Pretty drastic step to take. try defragmenting hard drive first. if you really want to reset to factory setting then you can use `restore` from progs/accessories/system tools.but back up you important stuff first.
Reply:Have you ran a virus scan to see if you have viruses.


Before reinstalling everything, I would try to rid your computer of any viruses to see if that speeds things up. If you do not have any (up-to-date) virus software, try installing AVG free anti-virus from http://free.grisoft.com/