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Desktops: Poll: Why did you last reformat your hard drive?
- 8/21/09 11:04 AM
I am a mechanic
by peacemarauder - 8/22/09 12:08 AM In reply to: If it ain't broke, I don't fix it! by artzyI grind my valves myself. I started working on cars about the same time as computers when I was a teen in the 70's.
Wiping a drive is about as common as wiping your nose.
Just very occassionally
by terrytalk - 8/22/09 2:11 AM In reply to: Poll: Why did you last reformat your hard drive? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Right back to the earliest versions of MS Windows, I have reformated and re-installed only very occassionaly and even then in every case only to resolve a Systems Problem that I felt was so serious I could not otherwise resolve it. With your survey already showing over 28% doing so for the same reason, I think the results speak for themselves.
Of course if the Operating System was always supplied on a 'chip', this would never occur, and would stop poor programing and virus creators from ever causing serious damage to systems, wouldn't it?
Stupid Virus
by srinath_msn - 8/22/09 3:16 AM In reply to: Poll: Why did you last reformat your hard drive? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
It was due to OS malfunction because of worms and trojans.
Why reformat & reload
by nastynick46 - 8/22/09 3:37 AM In reply to: Poll: Why did you last reformat your hard drive? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
My latest reload was to try Windows 7. I had decided to try it since the 64bit Vista on my new laptop wouldn't run some of the software (read older games). I d/l'd the Beta and liked what I saw so I d/l'd the Release Candidate when it became available. There's still some problems like my older Palm Tungsten E that won't sync on a 64bit system. I've been impressed enough with Win7 that I purchased a Technet subscription and plan to install it on the other 3 systems in the house when it is officially released in October.
I have always backed up and reloaded my system every 6 months just to keep it clean & running efficiently. I created a setup CD with the shareware/freeware software that I use to speedup the process.
My apache webserver program would just stop responding...
by jrfoleyjr - 8/22/09 3:42 AM In reply to: Poll: Why did you last reformat your hard drive? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
...to access attempts until I took it offline and then immediately put it back up. It would run for 1 to 3 hours and then stop responding to connect attempts again. I tried taking all my anti-spy and anti-virus out, substituting others, and switched firewalls thinking there was a software conflict. Did NOT help. "Hmmm" says I, maybe this is a hardware memory problem? I swapped ram sticks. Still had the problem. Next I loaded and ran the Norton Utilites WinDoctor. It found and fixed loads of registry errors. Still had the problem. I finally tossed in the towel. I reformatted and checked the drive for errors, then reinstalled WinXP and a backup of the apache server. It has been running flawlessly (about 3 years now), continuous with the only problems being other than with the computer (broadband outages, power outages, etc). My final diagnosis was that there had to be something in the OS that was corrupted as a reinstall fixed it.
Other reason
by squirtlewa - 8/22/09 6:22 AM In reply to: Poll: Why did you last reformat your hard drive? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
moving hard drive to a new 'puter
"Had system problems I couldn't resolve."
by sunwatcher - 8/22/09 6:34 AM In reply to: Poll: Why did you last reformat your hard drive? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
My hard drive (after about 4 years of faithful and continuous service) began to intermittently fail. Luckily I had backups of all important files.
I've only had to reformat 2 or 3 times ever, and only due to hard drive failures.
Why reformat my HD?
by 1AlexH1 - 8/22/09 10:44 AM In reply to: Poll: Why did you last reformat your hard drive? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
As a long time Beta Tester for Microsoft, Symantec, and occasionally other companies, I find that it is necessary to reformat and reload my system, after a long-running beta. It cleans out the garbage collected during the beta, and allows me to start fresh, when those betas are finished.
reformating hard drive/next weeks question
by be4ugo2 - 8/22/09 9:27 PM In reply to: Poll: Why did you last reformat your hard drive? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
never heard of such, i dont have the windows xp media ctr disc; my laptop came preloaded; interested in finding out what the answers will be.....
Poll: Why did you last reformat your hard drive?
by BARRY PETERS - 8/23/09 4:32 AM In reply to: Poll: Why did you last reformat your hard drive? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Fingers crossed,up to now I have never had the need to reformat my hard drive, as using a combination of free programs,Reg cure,C Cleaner,Advanced system cure,Smart defrag and rebooting, with on the odd occasion having to use system restore I have always managed to clean and speed up my computer.
Barry Peters
My two cents
by DerfX - 8/23/09 6:31 AM In reply to: Poll: Why did you last reformat your hard drive? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
My newest and main computer is over five years old now. I think most people would move on to a new one by this point but when I built this thing back in '04, I put together a package that was pretty hefty so today, it still ranks among the top one third of the computers out there. So I have had some experience with maintaining the system over long periods.
I have reformatted my machine twice so far. The first time was because one of the drives in my RAID went down and that was a hell of a day. It took the computer over twelve hours to boot up but it did a have-way decent job of recovering the data on the failed drive. I wasn't concerned because I always keep multiple backups so I just let it run until it was done doing what it wanted and it ended up running my system off of one drive. I bought another matched pair of drives, re-setup my RAID array, and re-installed my entire operating system using my backups to replace only what I wanted on it.
The second time I reformatted was a couple years later when I just got a wild hair up my you-know-what and decided to see if I could speed things up by reducing the Window's footprint. It seems the Windows folder keeps growing in size and I figured that starting over might reduce it and allow it to load faster.
It might have loaded a bit faster for a while but once you download and install every update that MS wants on your system, you'll pretty much end up back in the same place you started. That is providing you had a stable and reliable system to start with.
I have found that by running a certain registry cleaner and optimiser that I don't really need to do much else. I use the HOSTS file and a little proxy program to divert all the ad requests that my web pages ask for and so I don't get a lot of cookies or junk built up on my system. It's fairly easy to keep it clean and running pretty fast. Besides, that old Prescott doesn't like to sit around and wait for anything.
I accidently erased built-in Windows XP
by natalia - 8/23/09 7:28 AM In reply to: Poll: Why did you last reformat your hard drive? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
In April this year, I decided to try out Linux Debian 5.
After downloading this system and burning it to CD, I proceeded to install it onto my Win XP system. I was under the impression that the Linux programme automatically partitioned the drive in the process, and I chose an option facilitating this during the installation. However, that's not how it panned out and I lost my in-built Win XP copy altogether.
I continued using Debian 5 for a month and quite liked it with its built-in array of essential software programmes which only required onboard installation and activation. Alas, being somewhat limited in general operating system scope compared to Microsoft, I eventually decided to return to Win XP and was obliged to purchase an OEM version online for which I paid just over £50.
Performance degradation
by marekallens - 8/23/09 7:58 AM In reply to: Poll: Why did you last reformat your hard drive? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Even with a good regular regimen of defrag,anti-virus,registry cleaners and the like, Windows just by the way it reads, uses and replaces files will suffer a performance hit the longer it is installed. Every program that is installed, every registry entry that is added, and every file that is saved to the hard drive contribute to the operating system's performance decrease. A good maintenance regimen will prolong the time before it becomes painfully obvious, but eventually it will happen. A PC that has little or no internet usage and is used strictly for typing up the bosses latest edicts on business casual wear will last much longer than a machine doing complex data processing, 3D design applications, etc. The more real intensive work it does, the sooner you will notice it. I use a good maintenance regimen and benchmarking software. When the benchmark times indicate a significant lag in the time it takes to complete the same set of operations, I reformat and reload the box. My time is valuable, searching for days while the box is running slow for an obscure solution is a waste of my time. It isn't lazy..it is just smart enough to realize my time could be spent better using the box rather than searching, testing, patching and hoping the last little thing I did will finally bring it back up to speed.
Reformatting a Windows Drive - One of the GREAT Comp Myths
by rranger1 - 8/23/09 10:16 AM In reply to: Performance degradation by marekallensI continue to be amazed at people who propagate the myth that, somehow, there's a natural, inevitable degradation of Windows over time. In my considerable experience, if you have a decent, FREE, updated anti-virus and firewall program, coupled with a file and registry cleaning program such as Ccleaner, you can keep a perfectly functioning copy of Windows on your PC for many, many years.
One of my PCs is a 2002 Dell with the original, unrestored copy of XP on it and it runs the same as it did the day it was unpackaged over seven years ago. And, yes, this PC has had countless applications installed and uninstalled from it and accesses the Internet all the time.
I agree
by Crash2100 - 8/23/09 10:40 AM In reply to: Reformatting a Windows Drive - One of the GREAT Comp Myths by rranger1Until my hard drive failed a few months ago, I was using the same Windows XP installation I have had since 2002. All it really takes to preserve your OS installation is a bit of care in what you do on the computer, and drive imaging every month or so can help preserve your OS installation if anything does get screwed up.
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