My advice would be after a clean install of XP together with all the
programs, drivers etc. you're likely to want get Drive Image and image the
drive. Save the image to a different partition or CDR/CDRW then if you do
decide to re-install you're re-installing everything cleanly and quickly.
DI has in the past saved me days of work re-installing programs etc.
--
Kenny
In
Joe said:
I now have XP AND all my other programs on drive C. I'd
like to put all my other programs on another partition
and leave XP alone on drive C.
Can anyone suggest a procedure? What size partition does
XP alone need?
I do have to reinstall all my other programs onto the new
partition , don't I? Tell me there is an easier way.
The problem is that almost all programs except a few trivial ones, have many
references to where they are located, in the registry and elsewhere. If you
just move a program, all those references are wrong.
There are utilities that search out such references and change them to where
you've moved the programs, but I've nbever found one that's 100% releable.
the best, and safest way, is to uninstall them, and reinstall them where you
want them.
Why do I want to do this. I've heard reinstalling XP
after about a years use is THE best way to clean it up.
You've heard wrong. Although this is an often-repeated legend, it isn't
true. With a modicum of care, it should never be necessary to reinstall
Winodws (XP or any other version). I've run Windows 3.0, 3.1, WFWG 3.11,
WIndows 95, Windows 98, 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 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 application 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 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.
And reinstalling Windows prophylactically--without the intent to solve a
specific problem? That's simply nonsense. Almost every time I see someone do
this foolish thing, he ends up with problems he didn't have before--for
example, because he didn't realize that he needs a new driver for some piece
of hardware.
AND the easiest way to do this is to have XP alone on drive C.
Nope. That doesn't help at all. If you reinstall XP, you will still have to
reinstall all your programs. Deleting XP necessarily deletes the registry
and all those pointers to your programs.
