Should I do it ...

Hi

I am thinking about reinstalling Windows (XP Home Edition) but before I do I would like advice/opinions please. The first question most will probably ask is why? I have an acquaintance who recommended it to start afresh as it were. My computer is just sluggish. I don’t think it’s a lack of RAM because I have 1 GB and basically all I do is surf the net, download music from iTunes and use Office for work purposes. I don’t do any gaming so I believe 1 GB RAM should be enough.

I have followed the steps in the thread “Basic computer maintenance everyone should do” to check my PC isn’t cluttered with junk. I’ve worked through the thread “Understanding, Cleaning And Preventing Spyware” to ensure that my PC is protected. Finally, I’ve worked through the thread “READ & RUN ME FIRST. Malware Removal Guide” and my machine is clean. So all I can assume is that my PC is just getting old and sluggish.

So, does reinstalling Windows sound like a good idea? Or, would buying the latest version of Windows be a better solution or does anyone have any other ideas?

Season’s greetings, Mark:confused

 

If you've done the "Basic Maintenance" and the "read and run" then you need to let us know you're hardware specs.
Anything taking up the CPU in Task Manager? See any errors in event viewer? Any problems in device manager?
We need a lot more details. Is booting slugish, or is it slow to respond, period?
Cheers.
Oops Dom!

 

DomLuc: Could you please advise how I found out what make of hard drive I have

sikvik:
Hardware specs: Intel Pentium 4 CPU 2000 MHz; 1.25 GB RAM
CPU in Task Manager: taskmgr.exe 02; svchost.exe 02; System Idle Process 97
Event Viewer – everything is fine
Device Manager – no problems

 

Its a good idea to reinstall XP. You should be able to run Win7 32bit just fine as well since it looks like your comp has min requirements met.

 

Yup, go ahead and reformat.(Did I just say that?) Crap just seems to build up. I haven't tried this but a friend found that making and using a new admin really helped speed things up, or more likely got it back to where the speed was.

 

Thanks DomLuc, my HDD is Seagate and I have downloaded SeaTools for Windows from Seagate's website and run all the basic tools. All tests were passed. I have opted not to run the advanced tests because 1. all the basic tests were passed and 2. when I went to run the advanced tests there were warnings that the advanced ones might destroy or corrupt data or render the hard drive unstable.

I have MemTest running and so far no errors found.