Needs Help With HDD, Partition. and Formatting

[MadManders]

Hi,
I have an acer aspire 3680 it had a 80 GB hard drive, and I have a PS3 which had a 120 GB hard drive. I upgraded my PS3 to a terabyte and wanted to use the PS3 hard drive in my laptop but as soon as install it into the laptop and try to run windows 8 (only os i have downloaded) and it claims i need to partition the hard drive to install an OS.
I then re-installed the original hard drive and admitted semi-defeat planning to format and start fresh. Thats when i learned i cant format it all suggestions are dry leads and this craptop always fails me. If i try to install an OS with original hard drive it claims there is an error. If i try to download anything (been trying to get a different OS) it wont let me says it cant find the threads, on multiple pirate sites,

 

[Ad Hoc]

I recommend downloading Gparted.. Boot if from a flash drive or CD and hopefully it will successfully format the drive. Make sure to choose NTFS format.

 

[MadManders]

I recommend downloading Gparted.. Boot if from a flash drive or CD and hopefully it will successfully format the drive. Make sure to choose NTFS format.

ok i will try this after work i need to get some shut eye 4 hours till my ten hour shift. once the hard drive is partitioned do you think i can install over with windows 8 and let it do a clean install? (i already backedup my stuff) im new to tech world lol

 

[Ad Hoc]

It should as long as the HDD isn't damaged already. I'm not sure how knowledgeable you are, so I'll give you a rundown on exactly what to do.

1) Download Gparted ISO (Direct Link)

2) Download Free ISO Burner

3) Use Free ISO Burner to burn the Gparted ISO to a CD-R or DVD-R

4) Put the CD in and restart the computer

5) When the computer first boots up, you should see something along the lines of "Press <F2> for Boot Order". Select that and move 'CD Drive' to number 1

6) Exit the Boot Order screen and it should boot from the CD. Luckily Gparted has a built in operating system to make things simple

7)Choose format, click on your HDD, and format it in NTFS

8) When that's finished, turn your computer off and on, change the Boot Order back to 'Hard Drive'. Turn the computer off again.

9) Now turn on the computer, insert the Windows Installation Disc, and install it. Hopefully, all will go well.

You can also use a Flash Drive instead of a CD or DVD. Download UnetBootin, and use that to mount the Gparted ISO on the Flash Drive. Simply open UnetBootin and select the Gparted ISO and Flash Drive. Instead of changing the Boot Priority to CD Drive, you'll select USB Device.

 

[MadManders]

It should as long as the HDD isn't damaged already. I'm not sure how knowledgeable you are, so I'll give you a rundown on exactly what to do.

1) Download Gparted ISO (Direct Link)

2) Download Free ISO Burner

3) Use Free ISO Burner to burn the Gparted ISO to a CD-R or DVD-R

4) Put the CD in and restart the computer

5) When the computer first boots up, you should see something along the lines of "Press <F2> for Boot Order". Select that and move 'CD Drive' to number 1

6) Exit the Boot Order screen and it should boot from the CD. Luckily Gparted has a built in operating system to make things simple

7)Choose format, click on your HDD, and format it in NTFS

8) When that's finished, turn your computer off and on, change the Boot Order back to 'Hard Drive'. Turn the computer off again.

9) Now turn on the computer, insert the Windows Installation Disc, and install it. Hopefully, all will go well.

You can also use a Flash Drive instead of a CD or DVD. Download UnetBootin, and use that to mount the Gparted ISO on the Flash Drive. Simply open UnetBootin and select the Gparted ISO and Flash Drive. Instead of changing the Boot Priority to CD Drive, you'll select USB Device.

o format the drive that is already in my laptop right? once thats done should i try to re use the other HDD that is out of my ps3? im going through the process now for this one. and i seems pretty straight forward. thanks for all the help.

so this is t

 

[Ad Hoc]

No. Backup the data on your current HDD (on a flash drive, external HDD, etc) and then put the PS3 HDD in the laptop. That's when you format it.