Delete Hard Drive/Reformat to out of box state

I have a general security question, not sure if it belongs here. If I reformat my machine is it true that ALL spyware/virus etc. are removed?

When I insert the Toshiba "system recovery disc" that came with my laptop there are two options: recover to out of box state, and delete hard drive. I have no clue what "delete hard drive" means so I usually select the other option, but someone told me that the malware can copy itself back from memory when I reformat.

I have a Satellite, can't recall the model #, running on Vista Home.

Many thanks.

 

if you format the hard drive (not only recover), there is no chance for the malware to survive. even rootkits are gone (actually, formating the HDD is what Microsoft recommends to get rid of rootkits, those little *******s hiding deep in the system... luckilly there are some less radical solutions, but if everything else fails, formatting is the final victory.)

the other thing is, if you have any backups, make sure that they are clean (not infected) before using them.

i'm not sure about the recovery disc usage, i believe that someone will be able to explain the options.

 

It will restore your system back to the factory image. It is possibly that the virus could embed itself in this factory partition. Delete hard disk would be deleting the MBR and index so that the data would be 'lost' and able to be rewritten. To clean a drive completely you would need to write zeros to every bit or random bits such as what DBAN does.

 

Thanks so much.

Has anyone deleted their HD using the recovery disc before? I'd like to know what additional steps I need to take to use this option to restore my PC.

I am guessing that I will reinsert the CD after I've deleted the HD and choose "recover to factory out of box state", is that right?

I have very limited knowledge on this topic so just wanted to make sure that I will be able to get my machine running after Thanks again.

H

 

Yeah, that's usually all it takes... Either that, or just a reboot with the disc in the drive.

In case you didn't know, If you have any valuable data, ie. pictures, documents, etc., use a CD, USB key or whatever to save them... reformatting your hard drive completely wipes everything off. Just make sure you have an anti-virus running if you put the files back on your system (browse this part of the furum, there are a lot of free options if you don't want to shell out the $). You could also try System Restore if you don't want to go through all of the trouble of reinstalling your programs again.

That info was just in case you didn't know.

Good luck!

 

And when that fail's:
DBAN it to hell.