Turning over a New Leaf

I have owned, used and abused my cherished notebook (laptop) computer for almost 2 years and made a big decision on the weekend. I was going to format my hard drive and those who have contemplated or actually formatted a drive know how distressing this chore can be, especially if it goes wrong. Now it is not like my notebook was not functioning it was just very bloated with all kinds of crap that has been installed and either removed leaving some remnants or just not used anymore and forgotten. Since I have completed this task on my desktop unit multiple times I knew that their were certain files I needed to back up to avoid grief later. Since I use Firefox and Thunderbird I found the files with my profiles and all my data files and copied them to my external drive. I must say my external drive is soooo damned convenient that I do not know how I survived without one.

Next came the big step, actually formatting my hard drive and hoping like heck that I did not forget to copy something to my external drive. This is the most nerve racking time as you wait to get the Operating System reinstalled and then the process of getting all the required software reinstalled. My plan was only install what I needed to function and not install all the crap I had on their before.

I was surprised at how quickly I had my notebook back up and running with a slimmed down Program Files directory. Using both my USB drive where I store all the required drivers, spy and antivirus software and my external drive with the rest of my required files I was able to get my notebook up and running within 3 hours. Not bad as I was watching a movie while working on my notebook it seemed to make the time go much faster.

Now I have my notebook running faster with less crap on it, a successful operation. Still a nail biter as you never know what will happen when you dive into reinstalling a Microsoft product. Reinstalling and setting up both FireFox and Thunderbird was a breeze and Microsoft should take a few notes on how simple it can be to reinstall a program with the previous settings.

I am glad to get rid of all the extra crap and especially like the increase in speed.