Wipe Ubuntu with UBCD?

[HBWoody]

Hi folks:
I have a laptop with Ubuntu 7.10 only on it. I know absolutely nothing about Ubuntu and I want to install WinXP. Can I wipe Ubuntu completely with UBCD, and how do it do it?
I'm desperate!!!
Thanx, Woody

[The Piney]

DBaN would be my suggestion...

[HBWoody]

You can re-partition your hard disk with the XP installer so there's really no need to zero the entire drive.

The only problem I've ever had is on some occasions the installer wont remove GRUB from the mbr. To fix this you can use Testdisk to zero the mbr first.

Hello kof94:
Unfortunately my XP disk does not recognize any HDD on the machine.
The situation has changed a bit now. I used a Win98 startup CD and it allowed me to wipe Ubuntu and format a 30Gig partition as C:, but when I attempt to load Win98 I get a "not enough memory to initialize Win98" message, even though I have 2 Gigs of RAM.
My XP disk still does not recognize any HDD on the machine.
I'm sure that UBCD is still my best bet but right now I am in the second state of limbo...LOL
Help!!!

[HBWoody]

Windows 98 was only written to use a maximum of 512mb RAM. You can get a way with 1024mb but your system will slow down so I'm not surprised it's falling over with 2048mb.

One question about your hard disk's... are they SATA or SCSI drives?

Hello kof94:

"SCSI"

I have always assumed that the more RAM, the faster the computer. Why would it slow things down?

Do you have any idea why my XP disk does not recognize my HDD?

I have a DOS bootable flashdrive which works, but I'm like a dog chasing a car...I don't know what to do with it when I catch it:-)

[HBWoody]

You need to prepare a floppy containing the drivers for your SCSI controller.

Make sure you have this floppy inserted then boot from your XP disc.

You will notice it says 'Press F6 to install drivers' (or something like that) on the grey bar at the bottom during start up.

You should find that everything works fine from there on in.

Hello Victor:
Thanks for the info.
I have been reading Vista to XP threads and they also talk about installing XP HDD controller drivers to get XP to recognize the HDD.
Now the hard part. Finding XP drivers for an HDD controller which may not have been meant to be used with XP.

[TeckniX]

This is actually a common error with Windows XP's boot loader, not knowing what to do with the logical volumes on the drive.

All you have to do is reformat the drive to be in fat/ntfs type and the boot cd will work again.

I was having a similar issue and ended up simply formatting the drive using another machine.