Windows users... How often do you format and reinstall?

[EpsiIon]

I just bought a GeForce 6800 GT and a new power supply. It's been about a year and a half since I installed Windows XP, and I figured this upgrade is a good time to format and reinstall. How does this strike the rest of you? Do you think it's unnecessary or overdue?

[EDIT] I guess maybe this should be software, but I put it in hardware because you actually format the hard drive... Meh. I guess I'll move it.[/EDIT]

 

[Gerbil333]

I've formatted 3 times in the past 17 months. That's roughly every 6 months. The first format was because I upgraded to an Audigy 2 ZS. Creative's drivers suck, and I decided to format to avoid conflicts. The second format was a video card upgrade (Ti 4600 to a 9800 Pro). I formatted since I was changing from nVidia to ATI. The third format was not by choice. My hd failed.

If it wasn't for that format, I'd only have formatted about every 9 months. I won't be formatting again until May (unless I have another hd failure or something else crucial, like my mobo, dies).

That will make it one format about every 12-18 months.

 

[thirdlegstump]

Haven't reformatted my main box running XP since January. Still runs smooth and by the numbers.

 

[MercenaryForHire]

Whenever I rebuild the hardware, I redo the software.

So about every 3 months. I've got it all automated now.

- M4H

 

[CraigRT]

Originally posted by: deathkoba
Haven't reformatted my main box running XP since January. Still runs smooth and by the numbers.

sounds like me, I only reformat when I need to.

 

[Frew]

Originally posted by: deathkoba
Haven't reformatted my main box running XP since January. Still runs smooth and by the numbers.

WTF? You have a pc? I thought you lived on a mac.

 

[bigj3347]

every 6-8 months . . .or whenever i get an upgrade. I find the new hardware always runs a lot smoother when its done on a clean installation of windows.

 

[thirdlegstump]

Originally posted by: LeadFrog

Originally posted by: deathkoba
Haven't reformatted my main box running XP since January. Still runs smooth and by the numbers.

WTF? You have a pc? I thought you lived on a mac.

I have both. Quite a few of them.

 

[prontospyder]

whenever I replace the motherboard.

 

[Blain]

I swap out parts way too often.
So I've never gone a whole year without a reformat & reload.

 

[JustAnAverageGuy]

Once every two years or so. So about every time I upgrade my hardware

 

[Enchanter]

Every time some bugs ruin windows (which is not very often for me though). It averages to about 2-3 times in a year. It's worth mentioning too that I have laptop whose original windows installation has been working perfect for almost one-and-a-half year.

 

[airfoil]

Once in 9 months seems like the frequency I reinstall and perform a clean format. I spend a lot of time 'cleaning' up the build up and the registry in the interim though.

This is usually a result of a hardware change, but sometimes can be brought about by some probably unnecessary attempts to tweak the OS.

My current install has been running for 3 months now - needed to reinstall when one of the two RAID0 drives (Hitachi 7k250) began to crap out on me.

 

[Cerb]

~2 years.
BTW, should ahve done a poll.

 

[Kaido]

at minimum every 6 months. I just use Norton Ghost

 

[Winchester]

It has been 2 years so far for me. But I since I installed .NET my computer gets a blue screen NDIS.sys? (happened on 2 computers) and just restarts which is very annoying, so I have been thinking about formatting. I just dont want to have to reinstall everything again.

 

[Zucarita9000]

My Windows installation is 2 years old, and still rock solid. Never had a single bsod or lock up.

 

[moonsite]

I only format when I needed to. The last time I format was to upgrade from windows 2k to winxp pro. That was over a year ago.

 

[tart666]

win2k used to need formatting once every 6 mo, XP once a year.

 

[SonicIce]

If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

 

[Paulson]

I haven't formatted my main xp rig since I put xp on it... which is about 2 & 1/2 years now... it's never broke down and I've never needed to redo it.

 

[mnarciso]

I've reformatted many times with Windows XP SP2. SP2 has given me so many problems that it took me awhile to realize that it just might be SP2. So after many times of formatting and failing with SP2 I went back to SP1 which is pretty stable.

Releasing SP2 is like a crime for microshaft. You don't release a beta service pack without putting the word beta next to it... honestly it wasn't ready for launch and although some people don't have problems with it, many people also have trouble with it.

So I've reformatted like 5 times in less then a month. Usually I reformat when I upgrade hardware or i install bad releases like SP2.

Can you tell I've had it with SP2? =)

 

[sandorski]

As rarely as possible. In the early days of 95 and for awhile with 98, every few months was normal. After 98 was out for awhile though I could go 1 year without issue. Since WinXP came out I have only needed to reformat once after mucking up a new hardware install.

 

[Mem]

Only when I upgrade my motherboard,every few years or so,good registry cleaner keeps the PC and OS going until then.

 

[EpsiIon]

Originally posted by: SonicIce
If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

That's the thing. With Windows installations, they break just because you use them. In the past year and a half, my boot times have gone from about a minute to 4 minutes, and I run a tight ship. If I don't use it immediately, it doesn't start when Windows starts. If I'm not currently using it, I close it. I visit Windows Update regularly, run updated anti-virus software, and am positive that no adware is running. There's absolutely no reason my boot times should be this bad.