[header] How to reformat a laptop [title] Back up your hard drive. [step] Reformatting your laptop will cause you to lose all of your information so it is recommended that you back up your hard drive on an external hard drive, cds, or dvds if you wish to keep it. [title] Determine which method of restoration is provided by the manufacturer. 
[step] If you received a set of installation cds with your machine, then use this. If you did not, your computer may have a restore partition set up, which means you will need to employ a different method.