A week ago, I looked at my desktop and felt sick. Almost every square inch was covered with icons that basically equated to pure junk. I knew my computer was in desperate need of a clean start.
I had to think out the process so I didn’t loose anything and could remain productive, and I figured I’d document it to help others.
- Backup Data
I had about two years of unreplaceable data on this PC which had never been backed up. I moved it all to a shared folder on a networked PC (other flavors include USB thumb drives, your iPod, or just burn it to a CD or DVD). Of course, it wasn’t that simple, I had to go through all the files and determine what I needed and what I didn’t. One important item was backing up my iTunes Music Library. - Audit Your Existing Setup
I went through a long period where I would install just about anything, and I had no idea what I needed and what I didn’t. I used Belarc Personal PC Audit to print out everything installed and a bunch of other details. It’s worth holding onto. - Install and Reformat
This part was easy. I popped in the Windows CD (I was installing Windows XP Pro) and rebooted the computer. The install is a long, drawn out process, just make sure you tell it “New install, please wipe out and erase my hard drive.” It helps to be polite. - Secret Sauce = Partitioning
I wanted my computer to stay clean, but I didn’t want to have to keep going through this process; enter partitions. If you’re reading this you probably know more about partitions than me, but for everyone else, a partition lets you divide the space on your hard drive up into more hard drives. I divided my hard drive roughly in equal halves. The first half is for installing Windows and all my programs. The second half is to hold my data (that stuff I just backed up). I also created a tiny partition to backup some of my wife’s work on, but I haven’t used that yet. - Format Partitions
The first thing I noticed once I finished installing Windows is that the non-system partitions were unformatted (basically unusable). Formatting was as simple as right-clicking the partition in My Computer and choosing Format… Plus, you get to give the partition a cool label like “Data”. - Tweaking Windows
After that was done, I set about personalizing everything. Luckily, someone already documented most of the great ways to tweak Windows. The most important tweak in the list is to move the location of My Documents (See previous link under Set the Location of My Documents). I put it on that partition we made like this, D:\Documents. This is probably the best thing I did, because almost all programs default you here to save files. Now, when you get defaulted to My Documents, you are exactly where you want to be. Case in point, remember when we backed up our iTunes library above. Its default location is under the My Documents folder (exactly where I want it). - Drivers and Stuff
I installed the software drivers for my two printers and my graphics card at this point (those were the only drivers I needed). You might as well set your monitor resolutiion too. I went with 1280 x 960 - Install Programs Like Crazy
Now that Windows is working just right, I started installing applications. Here’s a hint: only install applications you plan to use regularly. You just cleaned up your computer don’t refill it with junk. Here’s my ideal list of programs:- AVG Antivirus - Free
- Sygate Personal Firewall - Free
- Mozilla Firefox - Free
- BitTorrent Client - Free
- Apple QuickTime Player and iTunes - Free
- Google Talk - Free
- ColorPix - Free
- Microsoft Office 2003 - Expensive $$$
- Adobe Photoshop CS2 - Expensive $$$
- Adobe Illustrator CS2 - Expensive $$$
- Adobe Acrobat Pro 7.0 - Expensive $$$
- Macromedia Dreamweaver MX 2004 - Expensive $$$
- Norton Ghost - Moderate $$
- Quick Launch Shortcuts
I like to have certain shortcuts handy in the quick launch bar:- Firefox
- Photoshop
- Dreamweaver
- Notepad
- Calculator
- Character Map
- ColorPix
- Browser Bookmarks
I also like to have several links handy. I made Gmail my hompage. Then, I added these browser resize hacks to the Firefox Bookmarks Toolbar. The rest of my bookmarks I keep at Google Bookmarks which I also put in the Firefox Bookmark Toolbar. - Custom Desktop Background
I wanted my desktop to feel like home, so I used one of those fancy programs I installed to make a simple gradient background. Nothing difficult, but it’s all mine. - Rinse and Repeat
Finally, I used Norton Ghost to create an image of my system drive onto my data drive (you can put it anywhere you want). Now, I can start fresh whenever I want!
February 24th, 2006 at 3:51 pm
Nice! I’ve need to do this for over a year now on my pc.
February 24th, 2006 at 5:00 pm
Just two things I kinda recommend:
1. . It lets you slipstream in all of your drivers and the new security fixes into your XP install, and burn a new copy, with the option of a completely unattended setup.
2. I am weird, but I like putting a page up on my server with my links, completely text-only. This way it’s easier to load, too, if I’m on a mobile device.
February 24th, 2006 at 7:42 pm
Great post Nick- def. my favorite so far. I would like to see more pc how-tos and tutorials like this. I’ve been planning on doing a reformat for a while and picked up some cool tips.
February 24th, 2006 at 9:05 pm
Two things to look at -
Instead of Office 2003 try looking at Open Office 2.0 - its FREE and fully compatible with all MS office formats.
Second - Run a back up copy of that nice clean new registry and put it in your My Document file - if your registry gets corrupted sometime in the future you can use it to replace your existing one - just go to the file and double click and it will replace the existing one.
February 24th, 2006 at 9:11 pm
J.R.,
I thought about doing the unattended install, but I didn’t feel like doing the research at the time.
Looks like you’ve done it for me. Next time, I’ll try it.
February 24th, 2006 at 9:12 pm
Anonymous,
I actually have Open Office, but it’s installed on my Ubuntu machine (I’ll have to post on that soon). I figure if I have a Windows machine might as well have Office too. The registry backup is a good idea, although I’m not sure it is necessary with a backup image of the system partition. Still, I imagine it’s a lot quicker to restore just the registry instead of the whole partition.
February 24th, 2006 at 11:29 pm
I suggest you replace the bittorrent client with utorrent (www.utorrent.com). It’s smaller, more efficient, & does not require installation.
February 24th, 2006 at 11:43 pm
I like that torrent client. I’ll give it a try, thanks.
February 25th, 2006 at 8:47 am
Haha, whoops, I screwed up that link, didn’t I?
Oh well, you got what I meant. Yeah it’s pretty handy XP installs all by itself. What I really liked was starting up with all the security updated and with everything but my graphics drivers already integrated. Plus you can also use n-Lite to remove all the accessibility features you’re likely to never use, even up to getting rid of Windows Media Player (since pretty much anything it does can be handles by VLC, I got rid of it, too). When I was done my install disc was only 350 megs.
But yeah. I’ve used my cool new disc a couple of times over the past few days since I’ve been getting all the kinks worked out of my new multiboot system (XP Pro, Vista, Kubuntu and OSX 10.4.4). Comes in handy.
February 26th, 2006 at 3:11 pm
well, i’d first suggest, im just being anal, to run the free DBAN utility you can find on sourceforge, let it diskwipe your hard drive overnight.
there’s nothing like a really clean drive just to be sure there’s no lurking problems.
March 14th, 2006 at 10:12 am
I can’t seem to back up my
computer, disks too small
I’d like to back up my files, &
pictues, so I’ve a clean hard
drive
I’ve an Windows XP Home
Waiting for a reply
Sincerely,
Jeannette T Dupre
teresita5094566@yahoo.com
March 15th, 2006 at 10:16 am
Jeannette
To backup the complete system, you need a program like “Ghost” and a hard drive capable of storing all the information you have on your hard drive.
I use an external hard drive connected via USB
Regards to Teresita
March 24th, 2006 at 10:43 am
i accidentally deleted registry keys which has resulted in internet explorer not working at full capacity.
will reinstalling windows xp restore the registry back to what it should be?
Please help me!
May 27th, 2006 at 4:42 am
HI newish to all this computer stuff. Had windows 98 on my computer bought a windows xp disc(told its much better) loaded it in the cd slot and ran the disc.Now I cant get anything at all to work, Im told the computer needs wiping clean altogether ?
Is this easy ?
would be very gratefull for your advice.
Jason.
January 4th, 2007 at 5:46 am
All very useful, but does anyone know what i can do if i no longer have my Windows XP CD or recovery disc? My machine has so many applications and processes that have downloaded themselves over the years that it’s creaking under the weight. Any suggestions?
April 5th, 2007 at 3:07 am
I cleaned a different way but it is completely cleaned and basically brand new. But i am having alot of problems with the drivers. It seems like my hard drive isnt installed and i cant install my audio or video drivers because of it. Can anyone help me? The error which comes up when i try the audio and video drivers is \device\harddisk1\dr2.
thanks
email cman555@gmail.com
July 2nd, 2007 at 1:25 pm
Is there a way to do this if you don’t have a new copy of windows or linux or the like to install? Is there an installer file on the computer that you can use to do this?
July 24th, 2007 at 11:17 pm
What if you don’t have the windows disk that came with your pc?