OK. “Initial Setup” is a bit of a cheaty title really. By Setup, I mean you’ve taken the decision to reformat your PC, and want to give this process a try. First things first. Backup anything you want to keep before giving Windows the big finger.
Be sure to double and triple check everything-I know from experience that there’s nothing more bloody irritating than formatting thinking “I’ve got everything safe”, and then realising after I’ve set the ball rolling that I’ve missed something. Here’s a checklist I use for myself-you can add/remove things from it, of course..;)
* Favourites-from all browsers if you use more than 1.
* Documents, Pictures..all your files you’ve created on the machine.
* Programs/Installers you’ve got on the PC for downloaded stuff, if you keep them.
* Saved games from any you have installed
If you’re 300% sure it’s the time now, set about reinstalling XP on your machine. A word though-when prompted to format the drive or partition, make your choice of FAT32 or NTFS wisely. NTFS ghost images can’t be modified after the’ve been done, whereas FAT32 images can. Not a big issue if you don’t plan to fiddle with the images post completion though.
Once you’ve got XP up and running, install your drivers and get it settled. Install your programs of choice and any updates you wish to include with Windows, for example the latest Media Player-if you take my advice, leave virus checkers off the list..they will be out of date come restoration, and they can be a bit funny with sysprep. Get the PC exactly as you like it..each program you install now will be there when disaster strikes and you need to restore from your image.
If you have program or driver installers you’d like “on hand” upon disaster re-imaging, put the files containing them into a folder on your hard disk labelled appropriately