Re: XP Home Clean Install

Mike wrote:
I just bought a nice new hard drive for my computer. All prepped
and ready to go. But this time instead of doing a clone copy as I
had in the past I want to do a clean install of XP. I've basically
had the same install since I upgraded from Win98. The registry is a
cluttered mess and other garbage files left behind from software
installs / uninstalls / upgrades, various mishaps, blunders, and
oops, running the repair console a couple times, etc., over the
years. The one thing I'm dreading the most is having to go through
all the security / software updates since I originally installed
XP. My copy of XP Home is old, sheesh, it's barely SP1. So I'm
looking at, what?, a couple hundred or so updates? OUCH! I don't
suppose there's any way around that?

Before doing anything else...
- Download Windows XP SP3 ISO and make a real CD out of it.

Windows XP Service Pack 3 - ISO-9660 CD Image File
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=2fcde6ce-b5fb-4488-8c50-fe22559d164e&DisplayLang=en

- Download the hardware drivers for the computer in question. Be sure to
get the motherboard chipset, network, video, sound at least - if you use a
dial-up modem - download that as well. Save them to some external medium
(CD, DVD, thumb drive, external hard disk drive, etc.)

I suggest running "Belarc Advisor" on your computer to get the information
you need on what to download. Also - print the Belarc Advisor results. It
will make things easier in the future - as it contains a lot of useful
information about your current setup.

Then...

- Disconnect your computer from any method of connecting to the Internet.
(Network cable, Modem cable, whatever.)
- Put in the new hard disk drive - disconnecting the old one completely for
now.
- Install Windows XP Home Edition.
- Install the hardware drivers you downloaded earlier.
- Reboot as needed.
- Install SP3.
- Reboot as needed *and* one additional reboot before continuing...
- Connect back to the Internet.
- Visit http://windowsupdate.microsoft.com/ and install whatever it needs
you to tro convert to "Microsoft Updates".
- Once that is installed - do a "Custom" scan for updates and feel free to
install all Critical and all "Optional Software Updates". Avoid the
"Optional Hardware Updates" as they are sometimes untrustworthy, IMHO.

If you are worried about how many you will need - SP3 handled much of the
updating needs. You will probably end up needing more "Optional" than
"Critical" *overall* because you will get things like Media Player 11,
SilverLight, .Net FrameWork 1.1, 2.0. 3.0 (3.5 isn't there, yet. hah) andso
on. Maybe 15-20 total 'critical updates *not* related to those optional
updates you'll get... Maybe.

You could download SP3 for IT professionals and use it to integrate into
your installation media for Windows XP and install SP3 from the start. You
could also get the updates for Windows XP released since SP3 and integrate
those as well - but you'll still have to get the "Optional Software Updates"
that you want and all the updates associated with them in the end. ;-)

Just in case (although with a clean install - I doubt you'll need this.)

A place to get FREE support for SP3 installation issues *from Microsoft*...
http://support.microsoft.com/oas/default.aspx?ln=en-us&prid=11273&gprid=522131


Oh - then you can change your old hard drive to a secondary drive and
manually copy what you need off it.

--
Shenan Stanley
MS-MVP
--
How To Ask Questions The Smart Way
http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html


.

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