Advice needed; Win7 install/deleting HP partition

I ran into a little problem , I want to format.. and I like everything to be clean, like, really clean.

Never dealt with HP computers before so I want to be sure..
HP has a separate RECOVERY partition, so I made the 3 recovery discs and a backup of all the Driver folders. ( C:/SwSetup)
I figure I could format and delete the additional partition. ( make a bigger one later on)

Now that Ive inserted my Win7 DVD and I need to select a partition to install 7 on.. all of the sudden Windows sees 4 partitions in total:



Is it safe to carelessly delete every single one of 'm .. merging them into 1?

And later on creating another one being that I want 2 in total.

Thank you

 

make sure you have no other drives connected to your laptop. i dont know why 4 are showing up. i had 2 show up on mine - C (system partition) and the D - recovery partition.

i deleted both. i also had recovery dvds and the drivers downloaded for my machine just in case. you should actually backup the swsetup folder on the root of your c drive to be safe. it's about a gig.

 

Yes Ive done the backup part in the full extent.
And no drives connected, its all internal.

The only thing that bothers me is that the partition: SYSTEM F: is a system type of partition.
I think that means the system boots from there, in that case it contains critical boot files. So I cant delete it.

Crap?

 

^ if you are redoing the operating system, it will create a new boot partition. therefore, you can delete it without a problem. the system always boots from whatever partition your OS is installed on - in most cases, the C partition.

"system" is just the label on it. if anything , log back into windows and see if you can browse the f to see what's in there. i dont think it's important anyway since you already created backup dvds.

 

If that F: showed after Win7 installation, it should not even have a drive letter (preinstalled Win7?). It used as a boot partition and especially needed if/when whole disk encryption is used.

http://www.mydigitallife.info/2008/...en-recovery-or-diagnostic-partition-in-vista/

Those instructions I used some time ago to delete one uncooperative partition. I believe with those you can delete all partitions from the drive and then start installation again if you wish.

And there's one L too much in that Pavilion.

 

And those DVD's sure come handy, when that non important partition is cleaned for 200MB of extra space

 

^ LMAO @ the additional L in pavilion! good eye.

i created the dvds and backed up the swsetup folder but i dont think i'll ever use the dvds.... i installed win 7 the other day from scratch, installed all drivers i had dl'd from the hp website and the machine is running absolutely flawlessly right now. i dont see a need for me to ever revert back to fat/ugly/smelly/bloated factory default settings ever.

i may use them as drink coasters on my coffee table.

 

I made recovery discs on my old dv9014 and first time I actually used them was when I sold the laptop. Let the new owner deal with crapware too.

 

^ how very kind of you.

when i sell my laptops, the owner is usally blessed with the 'operating system not found' message

 

Look at the picture, and then look at the upper right corner.. it says what kind of partition it is.
In this care it isnt a 'primary' partition, its a 'system' partition. Its also labeled as system yes.

And yes Ive tried that, but it impossible to detect.. let alone enter.
Silly HP with their overprotected partitions.

Yes it is pre-installed. Thats why Im formatting it. Thank you very much for the link, very handy method indeed.
Haha and as for the type-o... im from Holland. It just seemed nicer that way. We love our L's over here.
Neh, I got a mod alert saying my sig is too big anyway so Ill be sure to fix it when Im replacing it hahaha

That sounds alright, im still taking one thing into consideration.
This feature HP laptops seem to have, but I know nothing about, dualboot?:

I think Ill just leave it alone for the time being.. just until I get some more info about this feature.
I succesfully deleted all the other partitions though and will initiate the fresh install of 7 now.

Thanks for the support!