Windows reinstallation poll

[forumdude123]

How many times did you have to reinstall windows?

[Michael_Knight]

Every week, due to the nature of my work, we need fresh machines.

[jbennet]

i reinstall my main pc every 3 to 6 months - always seems to break itself

vista is better - had that nearly a year and never needed to reinstall it

[MidiMagic]

I had to reinstall one time, because some dope produced some software on CD with bogus copy protection.

The software ASSUMED that the computer had one or two floppy drives, a hard disk, and a CD drive. So it issued a command to write to the D: drive master directory, so that if the software was not on a CD, it would trash the drive.

For compatibility, my computer had 3 floppy drives: a HD 3.5" drive, a HD 5.25" drive, and a DD 5.25" drive. Thus, the hard disk was the D: drive.

This greedy software erased the master directory of the main system drive, because it was drive D:.

[vmanes]

Have to? Never.

I have done reinstalls maybe twice in 15 years by choice. One Win98 box went 5 years or so, was just getting all full of leftovers. Same for an XP box after 4 years or so. Neither was strictly necessary. My boxes tend to just keep on working and working and working....

I just don't understand the people who get their systems so bollixed up they must reinstall every week or so.

[caperjack]

my system is just over 3 yrs old ,and i ran for 2 years or more with original install ,then i bought a bigger drive and did a clean install ,but have done countless reinstalls for other people many, many , time for same persons!some people need it done every 2 or 3 mnts because of viruses and trojans ,they get from people they don't even know on msn and facebook and places like that .i use neither myself .

[Ancient Dragon]

how many times in your life did you have to reinstall windows?

My life spans 65 years, so its quite a few times. When I was using MS-DOS 6.X I had to reinstall it probably every week or so because my programs would easily trash the file system. Along came Win95, and I would reinstall maybe monthly for the same reason -- trashed file system. Each succeeding version of Windows brought better and more secure file systems. I have not had to reinstall Windows at all since W2K. I have reinstalled a time or two over the past 5 years just to upgrade the hard drives. I always run anti-virus programs so I've never had to reinstall due to viruses.

[caperjack]

I always run anti-virus programs so I've never had to reinstall due to viruses.

so do the people im talking about ,I can't explain it !!

[forumdude123]

I have just reinstalled windows today, probably 8-12 in my lifetime (of 3 computers, when i actually knew you could reinstall windows LOL!!), while the older pc's got garbaged or upgraded unnecessarily due to my older computer illiteracy!! I reinstall about every two to twelve months to keep my pc up and running at full speed. Also, if there was as timed trojan horse/ logic bomb, a reinstallation of windows (only takes 24 minutes to do its crap, two to three hours to optimize, update, update, update, and put all the old backups, etc. thanks to hp's quick recovery manager software) would kill it before it struck your pc and killed it. Even these days, antivirus programs can detect only 80% of viruses, except maybe one or two programs. I just live by the rule "reinstalling is key to performance"!

[Ancient Dragon]

so do the people im talking about ,I can't explain it !!

They could be running with out-of-date virus database, or ignoring the warnings they will get when downloading something or visiting bad web sites such as porn sites. A lot of stuff you download from university sites also contains viruses.

[jbennet]

99% of all my reinstalls have been related to bad drivers or malware

[Laser]

My 1st was when I 'upgraded' Win 3.11 to the original Win95. Very ugly. 95a and up was ok.
Got caught by a new virus variant that my avp missed even though the signatures were up to date. One bad video driver experience. That's it.

Other than that I've installed hundreds of times for others and as part of my job. I've always preferred installing from scratch over using a disk image or restore. I also never upgrade an OS(since that 95 fiasco), i do clean installs.

[forumdude123]

75% because i want to have the highest performance

25% because of viruses, slowness, crapware, and things of that sort

[bobbyraw]

i have been working with microsoft product from the DOS days to win 3.11 up to longhorn beta NOw, i did not see a number that match the amount of times i had to reinstall windows .....countless,,

Personally i do my system over every year most of the time just for the heck of it....i love to test, break and fix...thats why i Adore VM ware so much, now i dont have to use my real machine any more, but i love reinstalling XP

[forumdude123]

i love to test, break, and fix too, especially with vista. Best part is, while others are reinstalling windows for two hours, i can reformat, clean, reinstall in 25 minutes, and finish updates, updates, and more updates, as well as software before the two hour mark!

[roryk]

I'm a developer, so I have to reinstall quite often due to the work I do (I live in the Windows Registry, Remove the Explorer Shell, etc as well as testing other's code that is out there on the web), but typically it is not as much as It could be if I did not know how to fix the problem; I also repair PCs for certain persons and hence I reinstall Windows ALOT for others.