this laptop no longer has a c drive - only an x drive and a d drive (CD). if i change the drive designation in regedit it it changes itself back to x. it will not allow me to reformat the drive because it says it is write-protected. the hp recovery cd gets to the option to reformat. - i select ok and it dies with an error message. i tried to re-install winvista - won't work. bought spotmau cd to use to reformat or re-partition drive but it hangs up because it says there are no existing disk drives or partitions. please help or this laptop is toast

After booting to the Vista DVD, can you delete the partition rather than reformat it ? Look at this too: http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_do_yo... and this too: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/300415 Regards SuatCINI

i can't boot windows either from my 'rescue' cd nor from my windows vista home premium cd nor from the hp recovery cd nor from the spotmau recovery disk that i just paid $50 for. i was going to try the dos fdisk command but for the last few hours i can't even get the rescue disk to boot which is the only way i had to get into command mode. - no matter which cd i try to boot now i can only get to a screen that tells me windows is loading then svreen goes black, a few minutes later an arrow ponter appears and then it just hangs up.

Is DVD-ROM drive the first boot drive in BIOS ? Most of the time it is the hard disk that is the first boot drive. Go into BIOS settings and make DVD drive the first boot drive. Regards SuatCINI

You can't have a drive x and no c as such. Look at computer manager mmc for storage and look at the drive partitions. Could it be that you are somehow running from the recovery disk? Normally on PE (preinstallation environment) the ram drive will be called X. C may not be accessible because MS thinks you will mess up the system. Playing to the angels Les Paul (1915-2009)

i can't look at the drive partitions because every utility i use says i have no drive at all - btw - i briefly got to a screen via one of the utility disks where i could reformat, so i did that and got back the c drive. after a while the c drive again disappeared and now i have only the x drive back - c drive is gone again. i'm gettin ready to toss this thing thru the back door.

hey -i just noticed your les paul ref - i have enjoyed my lp deluxe since 1973 (goldtop) - ratown, bro