Guide in reformatting a PC via a USB

1. Prepare your Windows Operation System installer in a USB drive using Rufus.

2. Check BIOS configuration in the PC and enable USB boot. One you have set the ‘Enable USB Boot’,
press F10 to save changes. Before you continue to make sure to insert the USB.

3. Insert USB drive into the USB port to enable the installation boot-up.

4. Windows 7 installation will detect the USB and starts the installation process.

5. Follow along the screen setup and be familiar with it.

Then we switch from a DOS-looking progress bar to a cute Windows-looking progress bar:
Next we get the first Windows 7 install screen. This is the spot to insert the angelic music.

Leave options as is and click Next.

Install Now.

Check the box and click Next.

Select Advanced

Select Custom (advanced) – this will allow you to partition the hard drive.
If you click on the link that reads “Drive options (advanced)”, you’ll see some options for
managing hard disk partitions:
Click on New

The Unallocated Space will depend on the size of your hard drive. Usually we have 300-500GB
of Total Size. We will have half the size of this hard drive in order for us to create a separate
drive. If it is around 500GB, the size to be set is in MB, so just enter 250000 (MB) that’s more or
less (250GB). Click Apply.
In this screen you see the "Reserved Partition" of 100 MB. I recommend keeping this. Next, you
have the options of creating a new partition in the unallocated space, extending the selected
partition into the unallocated space, shrinking the selected partition, or deleting one or all
existing partitions.
We can create another partition using the Unallocated Space. Just click on that and select New
(not Extend). Another screen shows up to allocated the size, just enter the maximum value and
click Apply.

After which, you will normally have 3 disk partitions.

Disk 0 – this is a reserve partition created by the system itself. We do not worry about this.

Disk 1 – this is where we install our OS.

Disk 2 – Extra drive. We can install other programs here later on.

So select Disk 1 and click Next.

Finally, the actual installation begins.

At some point, near the end of the installation, Windows boots for the first time. It lives!
This was an interesting detail during the boot process:

All of the services apparently start firing up, as the boot process continues. (Hallelujah)!
And for some reason, we’re allowed to go back and look at this status dialog one more time.

And then back to the main boot screen. (Are you starting to feel as if you were really there)?
Oh, this is a nice little touch. No screen flickers or anything, but nice to know that it’s
“checking” my video performance. (Whatever that means).

Now Windows is more or less running and we start doing some of the final configuration
stuff. First, we specify a default username. This will be the Administrator user account. Seeing
a PC name of “PC” also makes me think of John Hodgman and the Mac switcher ads.
Leave the password blank. Username will be: Admin

And (of course) the product activation key. Wouldn’t it be cool if every key had a barcode and I
could use a barcode scanner at this point? (My key did not have a barcode).
I also get to set my time and time zone.

Our time zone will be a +8 location. So Hongkong, Beijing will be the choice here.
Picked Work network and Windows 7 do some remaining network configuration work.

Finally, we are “welcomed” to Windows 7.

We’re so close, I can taste it.

And voila! The Windows 7 installation is complete and we’re sitting at the desktop screen. Note
that I don’t have that cool new taskbar in the build that was handed out at PDC. More on that
next time—the new taskbar is actually in the build and Rafael Rivera has found a hack to unlock
it.