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Well, two hours into my birthday, and...
I transferred files off the old laptop last night. Today, I spent 8 hours making a new Ghost backup of the drive and an additional 2 hours verifying that the image was intact. Then I transferred a couple of directories I'd somehow missed before.
And then, I got to do it. Type the single most powerful command of them all.
"format c:" (MWAHAHA! The power!!)
... (*thwart*) Which gave me a prompt, asking for the drive's volume label. Which I guessed wrong a couple of times, failed to find on the drive properties or anything of the sort, and then successfully guessed... (The power!!)
(*thwart*) Which gave me an error that I couldn't format the drive while I was using it to run Windows.
So I created a DOS boot disk. (The power!)
Which worked fine (once I remembered to tell BIOS that the new floppy drive the tech installed today actually works, so it can stop ignoring A: drive).
Except that the boot disk refused to recognize c: drive. (*thwart*)
Then I remembered that I have an OS reinstallation CD handy for the replacement HDD. (So much for my nerdly power trip...*sigh*) I didn't actually format or wipe the drive, but I did delete the partitions (c: drive plus the preinstalled "hidden" dell diagnostics partition). So now it'll actually take a bit of effort to read my old data, if the people at Dell parts find themselves curious or something. Short of actively overwriting everything, that's really the best I can do, anyway.
So, that's it. Old drive is boxed up and just about ready to be shipped back. New drive is installed. New comp is shaping up nicely. Still have some files to move around and maybe some programs to download off the web, but I've got the important stuff more or less in place. I've even got a spiffy new keyboard. And if it turns out that I need any other old files, well, I've got an intact backup image.
Should be smooth sailing from here.
*waits for lightning bolt*
I transferred files off the old laptop last night. Today, I spent 8 hours making a new Ghost backup of the drive and an additional 2 hours verifying that the image was intact. Then I transferred a couple of directories I'd somehow missed before.
And then, I got to do it. Type the single most powerful command of them all.
"format c:" (MWAHAHA! The power!!)
... (*thwart*) Which gave me a prompt, asking for the drive's volume label. Which I guessed wrong a couple of times, failed to find on the drive properties or anything of the sort, and then successfully guessed... (The power!!)
(*thwart*) Which gave me an error that I couldn't format the drive while I was using it to run Windows.
So I created a DOS boot disk. (The power!)
Which worked fine (once I remembered to tell BIOS that the new floppy drive the tech installed today actually works, so it can stop ignoring A: drive).
Except that the boot disk refused to recognize c: drive. (*thwart*)
Then I remembered that I have an OS reinstallation CD handy for the replacement HDD. (So much for my nerdly power trip...*sigh*) I didn't actually format or wipe the drive, but I did delete the partitions (c: drive plus the preinstalled "hidden" dell diagnostics partition). So now it'll actually take a bit of effort to read my old data, if the people at Dell parts find themselves curious or something. Short of actively overwriting everything, that's really the best I can do, anyway.
So, that's it. Old drive is boxed up and just about ready to be shipped back. New drive is installed. New comp is shaping up nicely. Still have some files to move around and maybe some programs to download off the web, but I've got the important stuff more or less in place. I've even got a spiffy new keyboard. And if it turns out that I need any other old files, well, I've got an intact backup image.
Should be smooth sailing from here.
*waits for lightning bolt*