How often do u reinstall?

[Tbirdkid]

Running xp pro, how often do u guys reinstall?

 

[mpmdpz]

I don't have XP. I have 95 which is highly unstable, but I never install because I have backup files to recover my pc.

XP Pro comes with ASR which is a recovery program that can recover XP when it fails.

go to start, run, and type in NTBACKUP.exe

you must have XP Pro, and the process can take up to days (depending on how much items you have on your hard drive)

 

[Amaroque]

Originally posted by: mpmdpz
you must have XP Pro, and the process can take up to days (depending on how much items you have on your hard drive)

Unless you have Raided Raptors.

 

[halfadder]

I usually reinstall every 6 months or less, sometimes due to performance or stability problems, but also so I can get a nice fresh install of the newest drivers. One of my PCs has been running Win2K for the past 3 years though. A good Windows install can last a long time, but my heaviest use boxes need more frequent reinstalls.

My PowerBook is still going on about 14 months now since I bought it. It came out of the box with Mac OS X 10.3.1 and I have used the Software Update program a few times since then and it is now up to 10.3.7. I haven't ever reinstalled the OS but it looks simple enough.

 

[Matthias99]

Never. If you take good care of a WinNT/XP/2K install, you should never have to reinstall it. However, if you're the type that constantly installs spyware, etc., downloads every beta program and driver you can get, and runs at unstable overclocked settings, you'll probably reach a point where you do have to reinstall.

 

[Amaroque]

I have to agree there. I've even had the "unstable" WinME installed for 2 years. It would also run for weeks at a time (on a OC'd machine) w/o rebooting.

Usually, I run one install per computer. Unless I upgrade to a MB that has a different chipset.

As far as OCing, my computer has to be Prime stable. If it can't run Prime95 24/7 w/o error, I downclock until it can.

 

[PascalT]

I've had my XP install going for a good 2 yrs. I hate re-installing everything, and this machine has been a rock stable beast for all this time, i am impressed. But since my mobo got messed up I will need to start anew this week.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Originally posted by: Matthias99
Never. If you take good care of a WinNT/XP/2K install, you should never have to reinstall it. However, if you're the type that constantly installs spyware, etc., downloads every beta program and driver you can get, and runs at unstable overclocked settings, you'll probably reach a point where you do have to reinstall.

Agreed. However - I've run across some hardware devices, that install device-drivers (non-PnP ones), and ... they just refuse to go away. I un-install the device and associated apps, try to manually delete/uninstall the device-driver... refused!.. shot down again.

Yes, I know you have to change the registry permissions for "LEGACY_xxx" drivers, since even Admin doesn't have permission to remove them, but ... I dunno, NT's registry has a lot more inter-related device linkage stuff than Win9x's ever did. I knew how to delete device entries under both places in Win9x, but even if you delete a device in NT (and it lets you - for a normal PnP device, say), it leaves a lot of stuff hanging around. I've just been a bit afraid to go in pruning stuff wholesale, for fear I cut one of the device cross-link references somewhere and muck something up. (Already did that with the networking stuff, you can't un-install/delete "IP Packet Scheduler Miniport" directly from Device Manager, you have to go to the networking properties and unbind that protocol driver from the adaptor instead. But.. if you no longer have that adaptor, or have deleted it, or it's not currently installed into the machine - you can't get there from here! So I manually ripped them out, and .. well, bad things happened.)

I'm not a registry noob, I know Win3.x's .INIs and Win9x's registry sections like the back of my hand, but .. I guess I still don't fully understand the inter-relationships between the different sections of the registry under NT. It seems like certain sections contain hexidecimal-encoded direct pointers to other keys in the registry (or perhaps they are bin hash values or something.)

I guess what I'm saying is, the long and the short of it is, system-level stuff like device-drivers don't usually ever get fully removed, and eventually that stuff can build up.

So I suggest, after a recent, new, fresh install - make a Ghost image, and then install your other non-critical hardware. If you ever need to re-do your system, you can back up your user files, and then restore the Ghost image, sans abandoned hardware/system drivers, and add your current non-critical hardware, and then restore your data-files/profile. (Just be careful when doing so with things like EFS - your username may be the same, but your security-ID most likely will not be, etc.) This can also greatly reduce your SYSTEM hive registry bloat. (Also saves memory and gives a tiny bit faster faster bootup.)

 

[Specop 007]

Ecery 6 to 8 months or so. Its a toss up between hating re installing and liking the new shiny Windows install.
It doesnt help I have kids who surf the internet, and the opporuntity to click things is enjoyable to them.
Which means I get alot of weird stuff on my PC.