1. Grab the latest drivers for your hardware - graphics, audio, modem, wi-fi
etc. Buy ($29 download - google for it) or try Acronis True Image 8.0,
download NLite, SP2, free AVG, and free Zone Alarm - to keep it simple. If
you do a clean install from an Upgrade XP Home, you might need the
qualifying MS OS if the installation fails after you format the system drive
2. Go the nlite way (nilteos.com), slipstream SP2, trim XP according to
your needs (don't disable too many features if you're not sure). At this
point you can also pre-install the XP patches since SP2 - a little bit
tedious to find out what specific patches you need on MS site, so you can
update when XP is running. Once you've created your XP Install CD, you can
either test it on your D: drive or just go ahead and do a clean install;
just as an aside, why don't you make the 60GB hdd the system (primary) drive
and keep the 200GB as slave - assuming they have equal speed and interface?
3. Unplug anything else from the PC except monitor, keyboard, mouse, CD/DVD
internal drives - albeit a USB wireless mouse might give you trouble; you
can navigate the XP Install screens w/ the keyboard. This is just in case
that you did not create an unattended install XP CD. Don't forget the "F6"
SATA drivers that XP asks for - if your Barracuda is SATA
4. At XP install, partition your 200GB and 60GB according to your needs -
say, 15 to 20 GB for the te system (c
partition and programs; you can
check the size of your ProgramFiles folders if you want to be precise but
don't forget to leave 20% of the partition free for defragmenting, page
file, temporary, internet, recycle bin. The programs you mention + XP would
be about 5GB but if you install more games you might get out of room; 10GB
might not be enough.
Make another (MyFiles) partition (10GB?) for... your files - say, email
folders for Outlook so that you don't lose your emails if you have to do a
clean install on C:, word documents, address book, Favorites... whatever
files that you change often.
Make other partitions for audio and for pictures respectively - most anyone
ends up moving that stuff on hard drives these days.
Finally, you can make yet another partition for downloaded files or for
testing some of them.
The reasoning behind of so many partitions is that you'll need to image the
system (C
drive on your other drive and you want faster times to make or
restore the image - hence, the advantage of a smaller size. Next, you might
want to backup your mostly changed files more often - hence, the MyFiles
partition. Since Pictures and Music don't change quite so often, and for
smart organization of material, is preferable to have them on dedicated
partitions; also, faster for, say, WMP to index the Music partition only
instead of the whole drive.
5. Once you get the partitioning and XP installed, install motherboard
drivers (chipset, usb? - should be on mobo CD or on MSI site), then
DirectX9.0c (even though it's in SP2), then the graphics, monitor and mouse
(if necessary) drivers. Next, go ahead and install whatever internal PCI
cards you have - modem, wi-fi, audio etc. Install one card at a time, then
boot and make sure your specific drivers are installed. Open Device Manager
and check any driver conflicts. The PCI slots installation order is a
controversial issue for 2 reasons: a. system cooling (ex. leave a PCI slot
free under the graphics card)and, b. arguably, possible IRQ conflicts. Then,
install whatever external gadgets you have - printer, webcam, external hard
drive etc.
7. Make you Internet, LAN whatever connections.
6. Next, go to Windows Update and... update.
7. Begin installing programs - leave the antivirus and firewall the last to
be installed since they'll slow down or even corrupt installation. Nvidia
specifically recommends disabling antivirus software while installing
GeForce drivers, for ex.
8. When you are confident that the system is OK, after you tested your games
etc, go ahead and activate XP.
9. Start Acronis True Image and make an image (about 3GB) of your freshly
installed XP - that will be your basic image where you can fall back if
necessary.
That's about it... make sure you make regular backups and create images
after major working tweaks and software changes. Might seem a lil' bit
complicated - albeit it's the simplest decent approach I can think of - but
'failing to prepare is preparing to fail.'
Michael
