Your computer was working perfectly well but all of a sudden it starts behaving badly. You can not play your favorite online games or do your computer programming projects anymore it really pissed you off. What will be the first thing  to do to address a malfunctioning computer?

There are lots of first level approach in dealing with this kind of scenario you can begin by reading this When to format and Why you need to format a computer and decide wether you can afford to format your computer.

Should you decide to format your computer then you came to the right place because I am going tell you what you need to do before you  format your computer harddrive so that you will not end up being a loser : )

Read carefully and follow all these steps before you start formatting your PC.

1. Backup your data from your computer

Insert your flash drive and copy all your files from your My documents folder. All files that you have created and downloaded such ad MS word, MS excel, MS powerpoint documents videos, images and all your installation software or Installers . You dont have to backup all your Installed Software you will simply reinstall it later.

But before you restore later your backup files ensure that all your files are free of virus or else virus wil spread once again to your newly formatted drive. But this would be pretty easy to resolve simply scan and clean all infected backup files from your flash drive before you restore it back to your computer

2. Write down in a piece of paper all the driver details of your Computer hardware components, peripherals and motherboard

Identify all your computer motherboard and  peripherals you will need this later If you dont have the driver CD that came along with your PC ensure that you have an internet connection because  you might absolutely be scouring the internet looking for motherboard drivers for your computer.  If you have the motherboard driver CD and the video card cd skip this step

3. Install a working CD/DVD ROM drive or an External CDROM from your computer

Some problems that prevent you from formatting a harddrive were attributed to a malfunctioning CDROM drives. Formatting software was integrated with the Operating System installation CD regardles of what Operating system you are using wether you are using Windows XP. Vista or Windows 7 or even linux operating system.

After doing all the preparations that i have mentioned you can now confidently format your drive without worrying wether you might not be able to restore the previous working state of your computer and without losing important files due to hard drive formatting .