Reformat and reinstall survey

[DJS0302]

I've heard that some people like to completely reformat their drives and
reinstall Windows and all their applications about once a year. They say it
makes their pc run better. How many of you agree with this practice?

 

[R. McCarty]

If properly maintained and imaged, it's unnecessary. Usually, this
is perceived as an "Out-of-Control" state, where normal types
of housekeeping seem overwhelming - Cleanup, Chkdsk, Defrag
Spyware/Malware removal etc.

It's easier to just start over than try and cleanup/maintain the PC.
That's fine as long as important data is backed up and protected.

I usually only do a "Fresh" install when upgrading hardware to a
new Motherboard/CPU where significant system hardware changes.
However, I have a notebook that has it's original XP install and
has never been reinstalled Fresh. but it gets regular maintenance.

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

In

I've heard that some people like to completely reformat their drives
and reinstall Windows and all their applications about once a year.
They say it makes their pc run better. How many of you agree with
this practice?

I couldn't disagree more strongly. If if makes someone's computer
run better, he's been doing a terrible job of maintenance all
along.

In my view, reformatting and reinstalling is almost always a
mistake. With a modicum of care, it should never be necessary to
reinstall Windows (XP or any other version). I've run Windows
3.0, 3.1, WFWG 3.11, Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows 2000, and
Windows XP, each for the period of time before the next version
came out, and each on two machines here. I never reinstalled any
of them, and I have never had anything more than an occasional
minor problem.

It's my belief that this mistaken notion stems from the technical
support people at many of the larger OEMs. Their solution to
almost any problem they don't quickly know the answer to is
"reformat and reinstall." That's the perfect solution for them.
It gets you off the phone quickly, it almost always works, and it
doesn't require them to do any real troubleshooting (a skill that
most of them obviously don't possess in any great degree).

But it leaves you with all the work and all the problems. You
have to restore all your data backups, you have to reinstall all
your programs, you have to reinstall all the Windows and
application updates,you have to locate and install all the needed
drivers for your system, you have to recustomize Windows and all
your apps to work the way you're comfortable with.

Besides all those things being time-consuming and troublesome,
you may have trouble with some of them: can you find all your
application CDs? Can you find all the needed installation codes?
Do you have data backups to restore? Do you even remember all the
customizations and tweaks you may have installed to make
everything work the way you like?

Occasionally there are problems that are so difficult to solve
that Windows should be reinstalled cleanly. But they are few and
far between; reinstallation should not be a substitute for
troubleshooting; it should be a last resort, to be done only
after all other attempts at troubleshooting by a qualified person
have failed.

 

[JAX]

My vote is,....BS

With regular system maintenance you can run your computer at peak
performance, virtually, forever without re-formatting. About the only thing
that really justifies re-formatting is a serious crash.

FWIW, JAX

 

[RJK]

This applied to W98/W98se, and varied according to the particular W98
installation and how it was being used ...or "mistreated" if you prefer, and
how well it was 'housekept' etc.
And, .... cluttered W98 systems that needed reinstallling were, more often
than not, the fault of the users, and the way in which they were using the
platform. Hardly applies at all to XP, again - as long as you do your
housekeeping regularly. XP seems to go on forever and is MUCH more robust,
and does not seem to "degrade" over time as W98 did.

regards, Richard

 

[DJS0302]

I couldn't disagree more strongly. If if makes someone's computer
run better, he's been doing a terrible job of maintenance all
along.

The problem is that most people aren't taught to use tools such as scandisk or
defrag. Many people treat their computer the way they treat their car. They
think all they have to do is put gas in it and it will run. They never think
they need to check the oil, the belts, the tires, brake fluid, etc.

SNIP

It's my belief that this mistaken notion stems from the technical
support people at many of the larger OEMs. Their solution to
almost any problem they don't quickly know the answer to is
"reformat and reinstall." That's the perfect solution for them.
It gets you off the phone quickly, it almost always works, and it
doesn't require them to do any real troubleshooting (a skill that
most of them obviously don't possess in any great degree)

I've read so many newsgroup messages in the past from people who were told to
use their recovery disk to reformat and reinstall Windows. My first thought is
sure it makes the problem go away but it really doesn't identify the cause of
it. What happens when the person reinstalls everything and the problem comes
back? The person could be installing incompatible drivers for something and
never really know it.

 

[Steve Nielsen]

I've heard that some people like to completely reformat their drives and
reinstall Windows and all their applications about once a year. They say it
makes their pc run better. How many of you agree with this practice?

Not me, but some folks mung up their systems so badly over a years time
that maybe they really need to.

Steve

 

[KernelMark]

One year is much too long, do it about every two months.

 

[Mark Petersen]

I've heard that some people like to completely reformat their drives and
reinstall Windows and all their applications about once a year. They say it
makes their pc run better. How many of you agree with this practice?

Disagree. And besides, what an enormous pain for anyone who really uses a
computer, that is to say anyone who has many hundreds of applications that
would have to be installed, and who has made uncountable tweaks to the system
so that they can interact with it the way they want to.

If this was necessary to keep a Windows system running smoothly (it is not),
the only Windows system I'd be running would be on a virtual machine inside of
Linux, only for the applications that simply have to have Windows.

You don't suppose corporations do this (reinstall annually), do you? <g>

Mark

 

[RA]

At home, never. For users at work, I have images set up so that if
something goes bad, I just reinstall the image. In the 18 months that the
users have been on XP, I have only had to reinstall one image.

 

[RJK]

...."Corporations" usually have strict policies about what can be stuffed
into their machines

regards, Richard

 

[Bruce Chambers]

Greetings --

It's absolutely unnecessary for any knowledge computer user to do
this. If the computer is well-maintained, the original OS
installation can last as long as the hardware does.

Bruce Chambers
--
Help us help you:



You can have peace. Or you can have freedom. Don't ever count on
having both at once. - RAH

I've heard that some people like to completely reformat their drives and
reinstall Windows and all their applications about once a year. They say it
makes their pc run better. How many of you agree with this

practice?

 

[Michael Stevens]

I've heard that some people like to completely reformat their drives
and reinstall Windows and all their applications about once a year.
They say it makes their pc run better. How many of you agree with
this practice?

Unnecessary with XP.

--

Michael Stevens MS-MVP XP
(e-mail address removed)
http://michaelstevenstech.com
For a better newsgroup experience. Setup a newsreader.
http://michaelstevenstech.com/outlookexpressnewreader.htm

 

[Alex Nichol]

I've heard that some people like to completely reformat their drives and
reinstall Windows and all their applications about once a year. They say it
makes their pc run better. How many of you agree with this practice?

Not me for one. It is one of those popular myths that had some validity
at one time. And may apply to people (like journalists) who are
continually installing new packages and making botched jobs of removing
them. I installed XP on this machine, as an upgrade of ME, when XP
first came out. I have not done a format and reinstall since I
originally installed that ME