Reformatting vs Restore CD?

[Tecknoholic]

Hey guys I just recently purchased a new Microsoft Home Ed. OEM and version and was curious as to how the restore cd compared to the entire reformatting of a hard drive. Does the restore cd just reload Win Xp from the CD over the current data or does it act similarly as when reformatting and completely deletes all the information on the hard drive then installs the OS?

 

[Lonewolf5460]

Our family comp is an hp and they make you burn a set of dvds as a restore set.The restore discs are just putting the computer back to the time it was made.So it does not reinstall anything but it brings your computer back to when it was stable and had nothing on it,back up you data though it will still overwrite your data.

edit
also the fresh insall of xp will just put xp on your drive.oviously back up data too.
in both cases your computer will not have anything on it but xp.

 

[KSoD]

Definatley backup your data. But as far as your question goes i have used a restore CD to install XP on a computer before when i had to do a restart. I have a Dell that got corrupted and did a reformat and install. It worked but also had to use the other CDs that came with the system to restore drivers, etc. It depends on where the restore CD is from (ie. Dell, HP) if you can use it as a fresh install or not. Most of the time its an OEM version not a full version so you should be able to do a install.

 

[Tecknoholic]

Alright I think that answers my questions. My main issue was that if I discovered some corrupt data or encountered an unsolvable error, a Restore CD would not delete everything from the Hard Drive to ensure a solution. I'm in the process of buying a barebones computer and have already bought an OEM version of Win XP which I believe can only be used once during an install, then relies upon a Restore CD or something similar to reinstall the OS. But it seems a Restore CD operates as efficiently as reformatting. Thanks for your responses.