XP Reinstall Question?

[strummer]

Okay - I have a new build that I just finished, I loaded XP Home and everything was looking good. I activated with M$ via phone (no internet setup yet).

An hour or so later, I try to Restore to a previous point since I think I loaded some drivers and software from the MoBo disk that are essentially worthless (used the automatic load function - mistake). But now I have XP locking up on me on the black M$ Windows loading page. I go into safemode and try and Restore, it doesn't help - same problem. 3 questions -

1. I'm thinking of a completely new XP install. What is the procedure? - fdisk to reformat the HDD, followed by a reinstallation of XP?

2. What is the deal with the the M$ activation of a reinstall? Will I have to reactivate (it would seem likely to me)? Is re-activation a hassle?

3. I've read a little bit about problems with nVidia MoBo drivers. Is it necessary to install these? The new build seemed to be working perfectly before they were installed.




PU- AMD 3700+ San Diego

Motherboard - Epox EP-9NPA+SLi

Case - Antec Sonata II, w/ 450W PSU

HDD - Maxtor DiamondMax 10 6L080M0 80GB 7200 RPM 8MB Cache SATA150

DVD/CD ROM - LITE-ON 16X DVD-ROM 52X CD-R 32X CD-RW 52X CD-ROM 1.5M Cache IDE Combo Drive

Memory - pqi TURBO 1GB (2 x 512MB) 184-Pin DDR SDRAM Unbuffered DDR 400 (PC 3200) Dual Channel Kit System

Video Card - evga 7800gt

o/s - windows xp home

Monitor, mouse, keyboard - fro m an old HP pavillion

[FireByyrd]

To answer your 1st question, I would just zero fill the whole drive. You can use a utility for that. Then ou just reformat via the windows XP disc again like the original installation.

Question 2: The "deal" is because Microsoft wants to limit piracy of their software, they believe that by doing activation they can limit piracy. If its within a certain amount of days? 15? 30? I forget, but within those days you should'nt need to activate. If you do, then just activate it when it tells you too. Its not a hassle. Seeing your computer, there is no hardware change, so it should activate automatically.

3. Nvidia mobo drivers, I did'nt install the IDE drivers because I heard they have many problems. Also I did'nt install the nvidia firewall because it caused alot of problems for me. So just install the network manager and other mobo drivers, except IDE drivers and firewall.