To each his own. It's free, and I used it for a Win 2000 Pro fresh install. It did a great job (totally unattended), and now I have an O.S. with no additional crap that works really well. And that's exactly what I wanted.
A TON of excelent help and recommendations. Thank you all. I'll wait on the fresh install for the SP3 then and meanwhile start by defragging. It's the junk accumulated at the registries that bothers me deep down...my win start up seems to take for ever, from logo in sight to having mouse control is >1 minute! When SP3 becomes available, I'm going to bite the bullet again for the 100th. time and format!
100th time? Well then, you really should consider getting Acronis. You could make a "base" image of WinXP + Drivers + programs you will always keep (like Office). Then next time you need a fresh install, just "restore" that image and update from there... it will save you TONS of time. (After you've had to use the "base" restore, you update WinXP, drivers, and everything else that's base and make an image of the "higher base".... play your cards right and you may never have to do a fresh install from scratch again.!)
FWIW... DriverMax sounds like a GREAT concept, but I wouldn't use it. While defragging, your drivers may be moved on the Hard drive and in the process of "writing-rewriting", errors might creep in. Maybe affect function, maybe not. When you "save current drivers" with this program, any errors will also be saved and reinstalled. There are usually only a few drivers to install anyway... chipset, video, audio, NIC... installing them individually takes only a few minutes. And if you use Acronis as suggested and form a "base" image, you won't even have to reinstall the drivers after the first time.
Also may be good when SP3 comes out to make a copy disc with it "slipstreamed" in so when you (re)install Windows, it's already there (saves the additional install)...those instructions will be out there soon enough on Google (can check on how to do SP2 as well as other programs/drivers you know you use/need...takes some time to adjust and learn, but saves time later). Beyond that: -O&O Defrag is an EXCELLENT program for defragmenting hard drives (a complete one should last you months, unless you're a seriously heavy computer user). -CCleaner as mentioned. -Registry Cleaner, or any related type of software that can scan, optimize, and clean your registry of any orphan entries (namely from uninstalling software and the like). -Adaware/Spybot (shouldn't have to run often though unless you hit a few bad sites or download illegal stuff a lot). -Try something like RAMMedic to optimize your RAM usage as well; also look to see how much you have installed, maybe an upgrade of more is needed if things are running pretty sluggish with several programs together at once.
FWIW... Using Acronis, I haven't done a fresh re-install of WinXP on any of my machines in about 3 years... though I've "restored from base image" a few times.
Excellent point! Unfortunately, Acronis never worked for me (screwed up my source drive, had to redo everything)
Interesting. I've never had Acronis fail on me. And yours is the FIRST time I've heard of it failing for anyone... If you have a spare drive to experiment upon, you might want to give it another try... it has a reputation for being VERY reliable.