Format PC and reinstall Windows XP

B

Ballyman

Registered User
Messages
280
Hi
My pc is infected with all kinds of crap and runs so slowly that it takes 60 seconds to open a word file.

I have run AVG, Norton and all kinds of spyware removers but it's still as slow as a week.

What I want to do is copy any important stuff from it onto a USB stick and reformat the HD and start again.

My dilemma is this though. I haven't got the original Windows XP disk anymore. I do have however one from work. It is missing the Microsoft Certification sticker and it says only to be shipped with a new PC but it doesn't state which one so I imagine it's a generic disk??

Can I install this onto my PC and use the activation code on my Microsoft Certification sticker with this disk??

Or.....would I be better off getting a keygen copy from a bitTorrent site instead and installing that??

Also, to do this, I imagine I only have to format the dist and reboot from the WIndows XP cd or is this much more complicated than I think?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.
 
Ballyman said:
I have run AVG, Norton and all kinds of spyware removers but it's still as slow as a week.
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I find those things destroy my computer even more:(

Ballyman said:
Can I install this onto my PC and use the activation code on my Microsoft Certification sticker with this disk??
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I should think that would work.

Ballyman said:
Or.....would I be better off getting a keygen copy from a bitTorrent site instead and installing that??
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The problem here is you cannot get help from XP support or leave your pc in for repairs as you will have an illegal copy of xp installed.

Ballyman said:
Also, to do this, I imagine I only have to format the disk and reboot from the WIndows XP cd or is this much more complicated than I think?.
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I think that's how you do it, and i wouldn't say you even need to format? Just boot the disc and install.
 
If I don't format the disk then all that crap thats causing the PC to walk will be still there, will it not??
 
I should think not, because it wipes the drive as it installs. And anyway the virus doesn't necessarily have to be on you HD, it could be in you registry for example. But i suppose you can't go wrong with a format.
 
Better to format the disk first - then boot from the cd.

But install disks that are 'only to be distributed with a new pc' are usually only made to work with the type of pc they came with, such as Dell giving a windows xp install cd with a pc you buy from them. The problem is that your serial code will most likely work (installing from the disk from work), but if your pc is not the same hardware as the pc that disk from work was designed to go with, you will have to activate this install of xp on your pc.

And so yes, you might be better off getting a copy of xp from a torrent. As far as I know, I think you can save your windows xp activation data into a license file before you wipe the disk so you can use it later - not sure of how to do this though. :(
 
Also make sure you're scanning your USB for viruses.There was one going around recently called recycler,it infected the PC and USB,but it was hidden on your usb so you never seen it...mcafee or norton didn't catch it but I think they may have a fix now.Also I installed Norton internet security for a friend and his machine just about came to a halt,so we had to remove it.
 
Before you go and do something difficult, have you tried using something like crapcleaner to remove lots of unnecessary start-up applications (http://www.ccleaner.com/). These can often be left behind by applications that you don't use but haven't installed, or where the install didn't succeed.

Also, do you have more than one virus-scaner on the go? These are quite heavy on processing power and will probably get in each other's way processing-wise.

Another thing to try is to defragment you drive.
 
Ballyman said:
My dilemma is this though. I haven't got the original Windows XP disk anymore. I do have however one from work. It is missing the Microsoft Certification sticker and it says only to be shipped with a new PC but it doesn't state which one so I imagine it's a generic disk??

Can I install this onto my PC and use the activation code on my Microsoft Certification sticker with this disk??
Click to expand...
Sounds to me like installing from this would be software piracy. From a technical point of view it may work but from a legal point of view it may be dodgy.
 
Re-using your existing license when the original HD install has been destroyed is not piracy according to my understanding of the license model.

As it stands you have a legitimate copy of XP, and you want to re-install it. If you re-install on new hardware and retain your old machine with XP on it for backup this is more than likely a breach of the license. If you wipe the original install (or if the disk fails and you buy a new HD) and re-install then you still only retain and operate one instance of the OS and that is what you are licensed for.

Your main problem (as you indicate above) is that the install disk that you ave to hand may not work either on your hardware or with your license key. It used to be simple in the days of NT4 when a license key was a license key and an OS boot disk was an OS boot disk, but now you have license keys for XP that only work with one type of OS boot disk and won't work with another.

z
 
FYI You don't need to format the disk, just delete everything off it. But even that might be overkill. If you uninstall Norton your machine will run a lot faster. Its the slowest application known to man. Then uninstall everything that you don't need. Turn off everything like disk indexing, Office addons, unintall stuff like Real Player, Skype, Messemger etc. Trun off all the visual effects in XP, like menu shadowing, menu animations etc. Then run AVG and Spybot, and AVG AntiSpyware. That will get rig of 99% of nasties. CC Cleaner will tidy up the registery and machine of other crap.

Whats the spec of the machine? How much Ram? You should have a back of your files anyway. You'll have to scan that backup to make sure there isn't virus on that too.

Its not appropriate to talk about how to install dodgy copies of software on this forum. So I'd avoid that if I was you. Often the cheapest way to get a XP licence is to buy a older 2nd hand machine with it on it. Linux is free though if you want to learn that.
 
zag said:
Re-using your existing license when the original HD install has been destroyed is not piracy according to my understanding of the license model.
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I didn't think that you could necessarily transfer licenses - e.g. a retail Windows license with one set of media to an OEM copy of Windows (or vice versa etc.).
 
clubman - I make that point above. You have and you re-use a license, but getting suitable media is a different thing. You can't transfer a license between versions of XP, but you can re-use your license on the same version of XP.

Using a license with unsuitable media will not result in a pirated installation, it will result in no installation.

Using your existing license with suitable media will (subject to destruction of the old install or OS instance) result in a valid non-pirated install.

z
 
aircobra19 said:
.... If you uninstall Norton your machine will run a lot faster. Its the slowest application known to man. ...
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I totally agree with aircobra19.

My main home office PC was running in slow motion a couple of weeks ago. I maintain it well and subscribed to Nortons Internet Security for daily updates for the past two years. After burning gallons of midnight oil over a couple of nights eliminating everything else I disabled and then removed the Nortons. The cure was instant! I haven't looked back since. I am using AVG, Lavasoft Ad-Aware and Spybot and, touch wood, haven't had a problem. Other people have recommended Kaspersky Internet Security 6.0. I use one Norton's application still - Ghost v. 12 - which I find invaluable for disk back up.
 
Why not install one of the many free flavours of Linux or OpenSolaris ?
No problems with viruses then.
 
carpedeum said:
I totally agree with aircobra19.

My main home office PC was running in slow motion a couple of weeks ago. I maintain it well and subscribed to Nortons Internet Security for daily updates for the past two years. After burning gallons of midnight oil over a couple of nights eliminating everything else I disabled and then removed the Nortons. The cure was instant! I haven't looked back since. I am using AVG, Lavasoft Ad-Aware and Spybot and, touch wood, haven't had a problem. Other people have recommended Kaspersky Internet Security 6.0. I use one Norton's application still - Ghost v. 12 - which I find invaluable for disk back up.
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I would also disagree with formatting and reinstalling XP as it could take some time to get all the software reinstalled and get all the original drivers back working again.
 
Formatting and reinstalling is probably the last thing you want to do unless you have all of your current software ready to install - you said that it takes 60 second to open a Word file....do you have a copy of your Office CD and license to re-install it and all the other software that requires licenses? Do you have all of the drivers for your PC after the format - Graphics, modem, network card, printer etc?
I use a tool called Hijack this to generate a log of various programs and registry entries that start when Windows starts when the regular Anti Spyware programs don't pick up or remove spyware. .
CCleaner was mentioned by yoganmahew earlier in the post.....a good free easy to use program that will clear out a lot of temp files and clean up your registry.....it does help but does not clean or scan for spyware/malware. If you want to run Hijack this and post the result here you can download it from the following link http://www.majorgeeks.com/download.php?det=3155 just do a system scan and save a log file.....copy the text in the logfile and post it here. It might be worth while posting the type and speed of the PC you have as well and how much RAM.
 
I would format, its quiet simple really, stick a bootable XP disk, boot from the CD, delete the primary partition, create a new one, format the disk using NTFS (not quick format) and once that's done just let windows start installing.

It should not take you more than an hour but it will depend on the speed of your machine and the size of your HDD(s). Personally I create two partitions on my main HDD, leave 20gbs to the OS and the rest to what will appear to be a second HDD. Then I just save all documents and photos and anything I find important to my D: drive and only need to format the C: drive to re-install the OS.

Though BattyB is right make sure you have all the discs or are able to (legally) download all the software that you want on to your new machine once it has been wiped.

If your software was originally legal then you can install the same version of the software from any disc legally. So if you have XP home and basic Office XP then that is all that your license covers don't try to install XP Pro and Office 2003 because it won't be legal (and won't work).

As for the software mentioned above, I agree that Norton probably slows your machine down more than the malware it tries to prevent / remove.

I see my anti-virus (AVG) and firewall (zonealarm) are preventative measures and not cures. I use nothing else.

Every six to twelve months I wipe my machine from a ghost disc I created when I built it first and it's like new again every time.
 
I tried to do this last year, I had an ex work machine with XP pro on it and it was running very slowly, so I tried to install XP home onto the machine, thinking that the installation of Home would remove the Pro version....but it did'nt ...both are living side by side on the same machine. How do I get rid of the Pro version ?
 
Deimos said:
I would format, its quiet simple really, stick a bootable XP disk, boot from the CD, delete the primary partition, create a new one, format the disk using NTFS (not quick format) and once that's done just let windows start installing.

It should not take you more than an hour but it will depend on the speed of your machine and the size of your HDD(s). Personally I create two partitions on my main HDD, leave 20gbs to the OS and the rest to what will appear to be a second HDD. Then I just save all documents and photos and anything I find important to my D: drive and only need to format the C: drive to re-install the OS.

Though BattyB is right make sure you have all the discs or are able to (legally) download all the software that you want on to your new machine once it has been wiped.

If your software was originally legal then you can install the same version of the software from any disc legally. So if you have XP home and basic Office XP then that is all that your license covers don't try to install XP Pro and Office 2003 because it won't be legal (and won't work).

As for the software mentioned above, I agree that Norton probably slows your machine down more than the malware it tries to prevent / remove.

I see my anti-virus (AVG) and firewall (zonealarm) are preventative measures and not cures. I use nothing else.

Every six to twelve months I wipe my machine from a ghost disc I created when I built it first and it's like new again every time.
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Getting all the OS updates takes longer than an hour itself.

Besides OP doesn't have a licenced OS install disk to use.
 
bruce wayne said:
I tried to do this last year, I had an ex work machine with XP pro on it and it was running very slowly, so I tried to install XP home onto the machine, thinking that the installation of Home would remove the Pro version....but it did'nt ...both are living side by side on the same machine. How do I get rid of the Pro version ?
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Format it.

Here's a good walk through:[broken link removed]

Just remember to back up everything and have all the required drivers before you do it.
 
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