What do you guys do to clean your system?

[JS80]

Hi Guys,

Do you guys backup your files and do a full clean install or is there a way around this? I'd hate to have to backup so many files and reinstall all the programs...

Thanks,

JS

 

[necine]

You should make an install partition, and a program files partition... I have 80 gigs on my main drive. 10gb for main. 40 gb for programs. The rest I leave unused for performance reasons. Should I need it though, I have it. I have other drives for files and such.

Install everything you need onto the programs partition with a fresh copy of XP... MAKE SURE IT'S EVERYTHING. Acronis Trueimage the main partition, and bang. Ur good to go. 5 minute clean install of XP whenever necessary.

 

[spherrod]

Yeah, take an image once you have reinstalled XP and your apps then you can restore very quickly. Like necine, I store all my data on a seperate drive.

 

[JS80]

Argh!! Such an obvious/easy solution...

Thanks guys,

JS

PS Wow you guys respond fast! Awesome!

 

[Kibbo86]

On this topic,

Are there any free/cheap imaging utilities you guys could reccommend?

 

[Smilin]

I've never done anything like this with XP.

What is it you guys are doing this for? What is on your system that requires a reinstall to get rid of?

 

[oog]

if you need to clean off your system with a new install or a restored image more than once every year or two, there may be something wrong with how you take care of your system.

 

[firewall]

Any imaging software recommendations? I have Norton Ghost but never used it. I have heard of Acronis True Image too. Is it better?

 

[ValuedCustomer]

Originally posted by: asadasif
Any imaging software recommendations? I have Norton Ghost but never used it. I have heard of Acronis True Image too. Is it better?

Ghost

 

[Hacp]

Ghost is worth it. Cough up the cash or buy a used one or something

 

[EatSpam]

I might reinstall if I were to build a new PC, but it would have to be a really different PC from what I have. Usually, I just use the same hard disk. I don't think I've reinstalled Windows since sometime early 2003.

 

[mechBgon]

If it's Windows XP Professional Edition, you also have the option of doing an Automated System Recovery backup.

Also, not to veer off on a tangent, but an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure (sorry, there is no Metric equivalent to this saying that I know of ). If you got your system infected with something, chances are very very high that you can avoid that happening again. So what seems to be the problem that you need to eradicate?

 

[firewall]

I have Norton Ghost 9. Is that ok?

 

[firewall]

http://www.pcworld.com/reviews/article/0,aid,107378,00.asp

What about this review to stay away from Norton Ghost?

 

[spherrod]

Originally posted by: Smilin
I've never done anything like this with XP.

What is it you guys are doing this for? What is on your system that requires a reinstall to get rid of?

To be honest I've not had to reinstall my desktop for nearly 3 years now - running XP. But out of habit I took an image when I installed it then. It's still running fine though but it's nice to know if I had to I could get a base install running in 5 minutes.

 

[spherrod]

Originally posted by: Hacp
Ghost is worth it. Cough up the cash or buy a used one or something

Yep, I've never had an issue with Ghost. That and things like Partition Magic are well worth the money

 

[oog]

Originally posted by: spherrod

Originally posted by: Smilin
I've never done anything like this with XP.

What is it you guys are doing this for? What is on your system that requires a reinstall to get rid of?

To be honest I've not had to reinstall my desktop for nearly 3 years now - running XP. But out of habit I took an image when I installed it then. It's still running fine though but it's nice to know if I had to I could get a base install running in 5 minutes.

Yeah. That's the weird thing though. When I last did a reinstallation (due to a failed hard drive), I preferred to do a fresh installation rather than trying to restore an image. It allowed me to skip applying SP1 and just do a slipstream installation of XP with SP2. I also was able to install new versions of key tools and utilities that were in the disk image. At some point, those images just start to feel their age.

 

[spherrod]

Originally posted by: oog

Originally posted by: spherrod

Originally posted by: Smilin
I've never done anything like this with XP.

What is it you guys are doing this for? What is on your system that requires a reinstall to get rid of?

To be honest I've not had to reinstall my desktop for nearly 3 years now - running XP. But out of habit I took an image when I installed it then. It's still running fine though but it's nice to know if I had to I could get a base install running in 5 minutes.

Yeah. That's the weird thing though. When I last did a reinstallation (due to a failed hard drive), I preferred to do a fresh installation rather than trying to restore an image. It allowed me to skip applying SP1 and just do a slipstream installation of XP with SP2. I also was able to install new versions of key tools and utilities that were in the disk image. At some point, those images just start to feel their age.

True, my image is based on XP SP1 so it is showing it's age - having gone so long it would probably be time to do a fresh install and take a fresh image if I ever need to reinstall now

 

[firewall]

Read too many negative reviews for Ghost 9. Downloaded Acronis True Image 9 trial and it keeps giving the error, "Registration database not available - try again later."

 

[spherrod]

Originally posted by: asadasif
Read too many negative reviews for Ghost 9. Downloaded Acronis True Image 9 trial and it keeps giving the error, "Registration database not available - try again later."

I've not had problems with Ghost - use it at home as well as at work, ghosting systems on a regular basis. Acronis is also meant to be good but if you have a copy of Ghost why not give it a try?

 

[Doom Machine]

i reinstall all the time, sometimes 2 or 3 times in a week but average once a month, on my machine i never could get any image program to work on my raid 0, tried acronis9,ghost,rdrive,winimage,restoreit but none would restore, either they dont work well for raid or dont like my hardware but if they work on your machine i would go for acronis 9, has a nice F11 boot feature to restore if you system wont load windows

 

[firewall]

Acronis has been giving problems. It doesn't goes past the registration page. I thought registering of software was optional and activation was more prevelant.

 

[nweaver]

imaging on raid0 is hard, as usually raid0 on motherboards is "driver" based, and not a true hardware solution, so the image program sees 2 drives, with odd partitions.

 

[JackMDS]

IMHO, Acronis is better than Ghost is. Acronis TrueImage 8 is very stable, and works very well.

Acronis 9 was released recently and might be a little buggy.

Acronis seem to shift from Shareware to Trialware so if you did not buy it, and do not have a lic. number, look for Trialaware version.

There is a free imaging program that works only with Windows XP. It is Not as good as Acronis , it depends in part on Windows partitioning, and it is Slow, but it is Free.

If you have patient and No money, it might solve your problem.

http://www.runtime.org/dixml.htm

:sun:

 

[JS80]

Stupid question - is there a way to partition without reinstalling?