hello,
i woulded if anybody could give me a walk through on how to format a dell inspiron 6000 laptop.

I do not have any disks (windows xp etc).
Simple english would be a big help to as i am not 100% with these things.

Many thanks in advance,keep up the good work.
Karac.

Reformatting and reinstalling (which should ALWAYS be a last resort effort to fix a broken machine) is not easy, especially with a notebook - with or without disks - but worse without. Since you don't have the disks, I suggest you look at New to Dell Forums - Need help reinstalling OS on Dell Inspiron 6000 - DELL COMMUNITY.

I would also suggest you let us know why you want to do this, then maybe we can help you fix it, rather than reverting to such drastic measures which can result in total loss of data, and set your computer months, if not longer, behind in security updates.

ah!
Point taken.

The reason for the re-install is because the laptop does not connect to the internet after my son "dropped " it and broke the internal chassis,split the outer casing and bent the screen.I do not know if it was switched on or not when it was dropped.
Having repaired the hardware and made sure that all is connected inside again,minor components had been loosened.
Everything is working okay so far but it will not connect to the internet(??)
Having tried several leads (both ethernet and USB)still nothing,i have tried resetting all net preferences and a system restore to no avail.
It was suggested by a friend that maybe a re-install would help to correct the problem.

As my son needs the laptop for uni' we are running out of time and options.

Does this help?

thanks for the information .
Karac.

I do not know if it was switched on or not when it was dropped.

If the battery was installed, it may not matter as damage from the fall may cause a short anyway.

How do you connect to the Internet? Wireless? Ethernet? You say it will not connect to the Internet, but do you know if it is connecting to your network? If the network card is not working at all, a reinstall will be a waste of time.

Are there any errors in Device Manager? Have you considered taking it back, telling them they did not fix it right?

If you go to Start > Run and enter: cmd, then at the prompt enter, ipconfig, what does it say?

within the C:/WINDOWS\system32\cmd.exe - cmd box/window

C:\Documents and settings\"user name">cmd
Microsoft Windows XP [version 5.1.2600]
<c> Copyright 1985-2001 Microsoft Corp.

C:\Documents and Settings\"user name">ipconfig

Windows IP Configuration

and thats all.
The fix was a "home fix" by the way,no shop to fall back on yet,this is an old laptop and well past warranty.
we connected via usb cable to the net (although we do have a ethernet cable now)
karac.