How to reformat '06 Macbook Pro - cannot reach desktop

I have a 2006 Macbook Pro. I try and boot it but I cannot reach the desktop. My plan is to try and reformat it with 10.6.7 Snow Lep or 10.7 Lion (does Lion work with '06 Macbook Pro's, how about Mountain Lion?)
But here is the issue. I cannot access the desktop and the DVD Drive is non-functioning. The obvious solution is to do a bootable USB drive (I have another newer Macbook Pro to do the setup) BUT... since I cannot access the desktop, how do I actually do the reformatting with the bootable USB?

Sorry, I'm a PC guy (don't kill me)
Oh, I didn't realize you weren't part of the club. I'm afraid I've said too much... now you must die!
Okay, on a more serious note, Lion may work okay, but memory requirements in Lion are significantly higher than in Snow Leopard, and that machine only has 2 GB of RAM (assuming it hasn't had more added). I wasn't able to run Lion well on a 2010 machine with 4 GB of RAM (it ran great after upgrading the RAM), after upgrading from Snow Leopard... but I may have been doing more memory-demanding tasks than your brother, so that may not be relevant. You could certainly try Lion and see what happens.

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How do you reformat a MacBook Pro (OS X 10.7.3) 2011s Hard drive? I already backed up all the files I wanted to save. But since I have the new Macbook pro 2011 (only a few months since I got it) it didn't come with an installation disc, but instead already came with all the applications. I'm wondering how to reformat the hard drive so it wipes out everything and I can start fresh and what would happen to all the applications?

Well Lion has a Lion Recovery Partition on the drive you can access by holding command r and booting, there you can erase the Lion OS X partition completely (all files and programs) and reinstall Lion or simply reinstall Lion if there is a issue with it (no programs or files are touched in this second procedure)
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hey guys
i know this question has been asked alot but i cant seem to find an exact answer to my question. i have a macbook pro late 2008 with OS Lion install and im currently copying everything i want to save on an external harddrive, but cant seem to find find a way to reformat my MBP. i got lion of the app store and know that i cant just wipe de HD with Disk Utilities because i wont be able to reinstall OS Lion, on the net they keep talking about LION RECOVERY DISK ASSISTANCE but they say you need to have a recovery saved or somthing of the sort... isnt their just a simple CLICK TO REFORMAT BACK TO SCRATCH WITH OSX LION RE-INSTALLED?
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Sean

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Yes, and when I open the Network Utility it shows a working IP address, and a 54Mb/s speed from the wireless router. It even shows the shared computers from my roomates. But when I try to access the internet it does not load anything on Safari or Firefox ( or any other internet application for that matter). It is completely unconnected. YET, As soon as I activate the AirPort card on the top right where I have my signal strength, it shows on the Network Utility information that there are 'packages' being sent and received, and I have NO programs open what so ever, I have closed everything except finder and network utility... Does this mean I am being hacked, or have some sort of Trojan or something in my computer? I ran an antivirus that my school provided, called Virex by McAfee, it came out clean except it says it cannot read one file.
I tried repairing my disk, and that did not work either. I did the Ram reset like you suggested, but that also did not work. I doubt it being a hardware error. I am going to try to connect it to an ethernet cable to see if that will work. Then I will let you know what happens with that, but that would still not be a solution since I need it wireless, cause the router is in another part of the house.
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How to reformat '06 Macbook Pro - cannot reach desktop

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