There are lots of reasons that we fall out of love with our computers. Slow performance, viruses. spyware and just plain too-much-crap-all-over-the-place syndrome. The only way you can be sure to solve these issues is to wipe and re-load your system. If you have all the install disks for Windows (or your OS of choice) and your software, the process is fairly straightforward. Mac/Linux fanboy warning: I’m going to use Windows examples and software in most cases… deal with it.
After the tutorial, I’ve included a list of applications that you can use to make your computing life better. The list contains free and open-source software from the original developers that you can trust on your newly cleaned system. I highly recommend reading over the list, and even trying a few of them out on your current system before installing any of your old apps and tools.
Things you’ll need
- Infected (or otherwise underperforming computer)
- OS re-install disks (and product keys!!)
- External hard drive (strongly recommended) -or-
- Backup media (CDs, DVDs)
Step 1: Backup your data
You should already have a backup process in place to keep all of your data secure. If you do, good for you but that doesn’t mean you can skip this step. If you have, or have been able to purchase an external hard drive use that to backup the data. It’s much faster, and far more convenient than trying to backup to external media like CDs and DVDs. Make sure that you take everything you want to have on your new system. Often overlooked folders include your bookmarks (favourites) and desktop. These won’t be captured in your Documents folder by default.
Step 2: Reinstall your system
This is the part that makes everyone queasy. The “delete everything and re-install” part. But fear not, it isn’t as daunting as it sounds. Once all the data has been backed up, put the Windows (or other OS) disk in the drive and reboot the computer. Once the system comes back up, follow the prompts.
Select the partition to install Windows on. In most cases, if you want to restore the system the way that it was, you can select the C: drive where the old Windows install was located. If you want to get into partitioning strategies that’s for another post.
If you’re in doubt format the drive using the NTFS system. It’s the default for most contemporary Windows systems and will work for 99% of people. Yes, Mac/Linux fanboys, I realize that it’s a Windows specific file format. You guys can use HFS+ (Mac) or ext3 (Linux).
Believe it or not that’s the “tricky” part. Follow the remaining prompts through the text portion, and GUI portion of the setup to choose your username, password, time-zone settings, network settings etc. These are pretty well all common sense.
Step 3: Patching and Packing
Unless you’ve learned the secrets to Slipstreaming prior to this re-install (in which case you probably don’t need this tutorial) you’ll need to install all the latest updates, patches and service packs for your system.
The majority of these can be installed through the Microsoft Update (Windows Update) site. The updater can be run from your Start menu, or by pointing a browser at http://update.microsoft.com/.
It’s really important to get these updates in as quickly as possible because typically the CD you’re using to install the system is a couple of years old (particularly with Windows XP disks) and will be missing a ton of important security updates. You may need to run this process a number of times before it catches everything. Just continue the process until the update program tells you that there are no further updates available for your system.
Step 4: Re-install your applications
Here we go. Putting back all that was lost. The first step is to install your heavy hitters installed. Office, Visual Studio, Adobe Creative Suite — the things that take up Gigabytes of space on the disk. After that, the smaller things, utilities, tools, games. Check out the software list at the bottom of this post.
Once everything else is done, install your anti-virus or security software. This may be a controversial decision for most but I base the logic on the following: AV programs make software installation painfully slow. The chances you’ll be infected while you’re doing the updates are minimal, so save yourself a bunch of time and do this last.
Step 5: Restore your data
Copy back all of the data you backed up in step 1. This includes your bookmarks (you did back those up, right?), and anything you wanted to keep on your desktop. Putting these pieces back is the last step to making the system your own again.
Realistically you’re looking at killing a full day with the whole process, depending how much data you have the backup/restore can take a few hours, but the process is pretty straightforward if you stay organized. 
Free software to help you out
Once you’re in the application re-install stage, there are lots of free tools that you can use to get your system working the same, or better than it was before. The other reason is that these applications are great alternatives to trying to find pirated applications off the Internet. Here they are, in no particular order:
- 7Zip – an archiving / compression utility supporting a wide range of formats
- ISO Recorder – Write ISO images directly from Windows explorer
- Avast – Free anti-virus application with regular updates
- Paint.NET – Photoshop-like image & graphic editing program
- Firefox – Alternative (?) web browser
- Thuderbird – Email client
- Feed Demon – Powerful full-featured RSS reader & aggregator
- FileZilla – FTP/SFTP/SCP client
- Open Office – Alternative word processor, spreadsheet, presentation & database
- VLC – Media player that supports nearly every format known to mankind
- Evernote – Note taking/keeping application that sync’s with the web
- Notepad++ – Tabbed notepad application
- Visual Studio Express – Free versions of the Microsoft development tools
I hope this guide has proven informative, and will help you to move forward with your computing life. Bring back that computer that has lost its lustre and make it uber-useful again.
Photo credits: wysz, S Baker on Flickr.
The time has finally come for me to pick up a new system. This is usually a very happy moment in a geek’s life; the time when you get to spec out a new system with some of the latest tech. Reading product reviews, selecting components… it’s fun!