Alternate ways to format a hard drive?

Question

Okay, so my boyfriend basically destroyed my computer the other day. He doesn't know much about computers, and he went to a website with lots of spy-ware and downloaded stuff that must have had viruses too. Now, my computer wont work at all. I have two monitors- the secondary one will work, but the primary wont so i cant open any programs, see the start menu, or see anything besides the other side of my desktop.

This also means that when I start up the computer off of the windows disc to format/reinstall, I cant see anything, since it's trying to run on my primary monitor. I have tried switching the monitors; that is not the problem.

This means that I cant format through the computer itself, as all my windows open on the side I cant see, and I Cant format through the CD.

My question is... is there any other way for me to format without A) needing to start up from a disc or B) needing to open something on the computer...... I'm pretty sure there isn't, but any ideas would be appreciated....

A Couple Extra Things: I had no spy ware or virus protection (I've never had a problem and being a computer person I knew what to avoid, etc. My boyfriend was not allowed on my computer, if he was I would have had something since I know he'd do something stupid like that.) and I obviously cant install any now, since I cant see my primary screen, so I cant try and fix it enough to get my primary screen working to format.

Secondly, My computer is a custom built desktop using windows XP.

I'd appreciate if all replies only contained possible solutions, and if you don't know- don't share that fact just to get points. Sorry, I just get very annoyed with some of the people on this site.

IF YOU AREN'T ANSWERING MY QUESTION DIRECTLY DO NOT RESPOND!

Answer 1

Does anything show up on your primary screen when you restart the computer (like Dell or HP, or Intel since yours is custom built?) If so, the best way to reformat your hard drive is to use the windows installer disk. Just put the disk in and restart the computer and boot from the disk. If that doesn't work or you just want to erase the entire drive, use a program like gparted to reformat everything. http://gparted.sourceforge.net/ is where you can download the disk image and burn to a disk, and then boot from that disk (you would obviously need another computer to burn a disk).

I've reformatted my drive many times using those two methods, on different computers as well

Answer 2

Have you looked at, right click destop > properties > display settings > you will see 2 monitors click on the monitor that isnt showing.

Answer 3

I am wondering why you still have both monitors hooked up? If you disconnect one, would the desktop not show on the other?

If not, there is some hardware tweaking you can try. All I can think of is removing the HDD and putting it in an enclosure then attaching to another computer. You can manually clean out whatever you want.