Solved Can I reformat HD with viruses, then install linux?

Derek January 26, 2015 at 09:35:30

It is unusual for viruses and malware to remain after formatting a hard disk. Always pop back and let us know the outcome - thanks

Thanks Derek I'll try it.

Fingers January 29, 2015 at 19:58:24

✔ Best Answer

A quick format just makes the drive forget that there is data on the drive and eventually most things will be overwritten. This is typically enough, even with an infected drive but if you want to be sure, a full format writes ones and zeros across the entire drive, just remember that it may take hours (depending on the size of the drive, speed of the computer, and a few other factors) to complete. You have to be a little bit crazy to keep you from going insane.

ricko again - Waiting for cd's to arrive, then I'll try formatting and install. I had an old version of Slack on there, but now want Debian to better work with my pi. Thanks to both for help, very grateful

I keep getting requests here to 'select a best answer'. For the life of me, I cannot find anything on this page which works to accomplish that. I can find no 'live' links with hints like that, no buttons, anything. Am I blind? ricko OK guess what? I have to be 'signed in' ; guess that was obvious, well, duh. message edited by ricko

Derek February 2, 2015 at 11:36:35

Nobody on here is likely to get sore if they don't happen to get Best Answer. Your question was whether a virus could survive after format My #1 answered that to the best of my ability, and #3 went further. So, after format you can now go ahead with a fair degree of confidence and install Linux if you wish. If instead you want us to help eliminate the virus/malware on that old machine running XP please let us know. I'm sure we can help, if for some reason you wish to retain XP. Fort the future, selecting a Best Answer is not mandatory - you can ignore it if you wish. The requests will soon stop coming. Always pop back and let us know the outcome - thanks

I'm grateful for the experienced opinions presented here. When the disks get here, I'll get to work on this old machine; I do recall some of Linux procedures, etc, and now there are a number of pretty good freebie books I've found online. Thanks for the help. ricko

Derek February 2, 2015 at 15:15:18

Thanks for popping back with the feedback. message edited by Derek