Warning: Geek Rant!

My Windows XP installation had reached its half-life. So I took the necessary actions to get her up and running again. This entry is for everyone who wants/needs to reinstall Windows, for me as a future reference, and for those who are simply curious. Here’s a list of what I did to get everything crip, shiny, and new:

1. Since I have two hard drives, I back up all my useful info on my second drive. (mp3s, photos, documents, films, ongoing projects, etc.)

2. I do a clean install of Windows XP Pro with SP2.

3. Following the clean install, I follow all of Black Viper’s Top tweaks for a much faster PC.

4. I make sure to adjust all the Service Configurations.

5. I download all the newest drivers for my motherboard, graphics card, sound card, and printer.

6. I install Firefox as my main browser, import my bookmarks, and hide the IE icon so no one can click on it by mistake.

7. I install the two most important bits of software on my computer: AntiVir and Ad-Aware.

8. Then I install my 1st level programs – the ones that I use all the time and that reside in my Quick Launch bar: Thunderbird, Winamp, eDonkey, Nero, MS Office XP, Macromedia Dreamweaver and Flash, Adobe Photoshop, Palm Desktop, SmartFTP, Gaim, Tag&Rename, and EAC with Lame.

9. Then I install my 2nd level programs – the ones I use less frequently and access through the start bar: AutoGK, MP3Gain, WinRAR, Adobe Acrobat, Image Resizer, Flickr Uploadr, BlogAmp, and the Audioscrobbler plugin for Winamp.

10. Then I install all the video codecs I need to watch all the films I download: Xvid and DivX.

11. I configure all of the programs I have installed as I use them.

12. Now I install all the games that I’m currently playing.

13. Lastly, I defrag my poor little hard drive.

This whole process usually takes me a whole day to complete. But it feels so good when it’s all done and everything is running twice as fast as the day before. It’s like getting a new computer!