how often should XP be reinstalled

[Liggy]

About a year ago I saw on the Microsoft's website (can't find it now) that said it would be wise to reinstall XP every 6 months. doing a Google search showed that most people recommend every year. So the question is what would be a good time frame.... ( not like I will follow it anyways ) I just format when I have had enough, which varies between my two PC's. Just want to see when other format their's... if ever...

[Vishal Gupta]

Format whenever u think its time to format.

When I used XP, I usually format it after one or 2 months but When I started using Vista, I hvnt formatted it to date.

It depends upon the system condition. If its giving problems, if u think it has become slow, then don't wait and format it.

[Choto Cheeta]

My personal View, Never, good AVS and proper maintanance can keep ur WinXP heathly untill u make any major Hardware change !!!

in my case I run WinXP without reinstall and without any problem for 2 and a half year with my AMD till few months back when I changed the PC to buy one Core 2 Duo based system !!!

[Help~Is~Here]

I used to have a system on which I used to reinstall XP as and when needed when I thought that there was a problem. It sometimes ranged at every 2weeks and varied upto 3months.

However, on another system (my brother's), where all the compenents were imported (which I don't think makes a difference), and since I dont' have the authority to reinstall his system, it's been working quite decently for about 2 years now. It all depends on your mindset. If you see slight problems which can be sorted out with a bit of tinkering here and there, then you really don't need to reinstall. But for most of us, since we are all so used to reinstalling, we don't put in the effort or time to solve such issues and take the easy way out! which is reinstalling.

I have personally challenged myself several times to try fixing major winxp crashes without the need to reinstall and have succeeded a couple of times. One thing that I would suggest is that you always have a backup copy of your major boot files like boot.ini etc. on another disk. And the one thing that has saved me so much trouble so many times have been the good old Win98 Startup Floppy Disk. It has worked several wonders for me at times of desperate help!

[nobody.is.perfect.eME]

Format ur pc vanevr u feells lyk itz geting crash , slow processing , errors , virus .................... i usually format in 6 mnths

[abhijangda]

i think format should be done in between one or 2 months. And it is recommended when tre is any problem.

[karnivore]

OK, a noobie question.

If u reinstall so frequently, what happens to all the customizations that u do to suit ur style. Am sure you guys back up ur user profile. But how do u back up ur user profile.

Am planning to reinstall my XP next month, so any help will go a long way to save my time in bringing the new installation to my desired state.

[cvvikram]

My XP is running smoothly for past 2yrs and i have not at all formatted the drives. Have installed anitvirus and that works cool for me......

Its not mandatory to format the system for a specified period....only if facing problems then last hope will be format the system.

[anandk]

Windows Rot will set in sooner or later depending on ur usage. so u need to format windows ONLY when u think it has become really sluggish. PC mntnce will prolong this certnty considrbly though...

Yes Vista has addressed this Rot businesss upto quite an extent...but how much only time will tell.

[satyamy]

I normally format my HDD in 2 - 3 months

[Sukhdeep Singh]

I have many partitions and C: drive doesnt have any imporatant stuff.

When i will like, i just use Ghost and i takes just 5 mins to get a Fresh Windows with all Drivers and Imp softwares

[enticer86]

well sm here.. format it once in a while... also make full use of system restore- sply befre installin a Big software or makin system wide changes
also, a gud virus scanner combined with Antispyware scanner and all helps a lot

n yeah, if u use the original softs, nuthin lik it

[Ihatemyself]

Depends what kind of person is using the pc.If a paranoid then he will maintain it so well that there will be no need for formatting for 2-3 yrz .If a novice hacker 2-3 months .Expert hacker- 1yr or so.

[Ramakrishnan]

For me the problem of formatting and re-installing doesn't arise because I use True Image backup. If anything goes wrong, simply restart with Acronis Boot disk and in just 10 minutes everything will be fine. The backup includes all customizations and other personal things that we do to the OS to suit us.

[Liggy]

Originally Posted by karnivore

OK, a noobie question.

If u reinstall so frequently, what happens to all the customizations that u do to suit ur style. Am sure you guys back up ur user profile. But how do u back up ur user profile.

Am planning to reinstall my XP next month, so any help will go a long way to save my time in bringing the new installation to my desired state.

You could use Norton's ghost, or Save 'n Restore (is the newer ver of ghost), but remember if you have a virus or some sort of corruption it will load that back, so best thing for that would be to install windows then set everything up the way you like it then create your ghost (save n restoer)image. I am sure there are other programs out their that are simillar ( I personally hate norton)

Thanks for everyones response, I'm just lazy I guess. I reinstall whenever I have nothing better to do/ really bored. I have had it with AV scanners not doing their job so I rely on the router and ewido's online scan to protect from threats. I run JV16 power tools now and then, and registry crawler. Lucky me has two computers so if one really goes, I can hook it up to the other back my crap up then spend the better part of the day reinstalling with all those damn dirty updates!
Is it neccessary to grab all those stupid updates ( I thought it would cuz one update might require another portion to be updated as well) for instance I do not use IE so would I need to grab all those IE updates, or would it still be better if I did anyways?

[escape7]

Only when the system starts giving problems...

[prem4u]

actually alwaz i experiment with my pc..
so within 2-3 month..it become necessary to format.

[clmlbx]

Less Then Two Months


2 Months

It Is Needed

[bhushan05d251]

usually every month

[~Phenom~]

never is the best answer. If u use ur machine carefully, u never need to reinstall.

[xbonez]

^^i agree. its been about an year, and i ahevn't needed to format my pc enev once. its still working beautifully

[ax3]

i do it whenever pc becomes sluggish ..........

@sukhdeepsinghkohli ........... has the best solution ....... i do it 2 ........

really time consuming ...........

[Vishal Gupta]

^^ thnx.

[casanova]

I used to reinstall every now and then. Since I bought my new PC in November, it has reduced drastically. Within the past 5 months, I have reinstalled only once.

[Gigacore]

I will reinstall when i face too much problems

[daemon]

I usually format it at the interval of 6- 7months but still trying make it healthy again without formatting it again !!!

[Naren Parker]

Its advisable to reinstall xp only wen the problem is waaay tooo seroius...
its always a gud idea 2 tinker with the settings in the group policy editor, registry or enable/disable some services...
that way, u'll learn wats rite and save the time of reinstallin

but if u r usin software like ghost or acronis, then njoy...