help please, i want to reinstall Windows Vista!!!

Claireylvsad_2

I have had my laptop for about a year now and programs have recently started to not work properly and have now got viruses:( so I want to reinstall vista and start over.

But the only thing is that I have all my music and college files stored and I dont want to lose them. I have two 60GB HDDs built in my laptop and if I reinstalled Vista would I be able to keep all my important files and still reinstal if I put my files on the secondary HDD ??

Thanx

sco0ter

Put all your files on the second hard drive (D or whatever the letter might be) and then reinstall VISTA on the C drive.

Blacksheep1979

If you have viruses you DO NOT want to copy anything that will be used in a fresh install

russ_gillespie

Not true, if Claireylvsad does as scooter says then the external disk can be virus scanned once the clean install has been done on the C drive.

marms

ronben wrote: »

Err is true, as long as they are virus scanned, but dont do this with a freebie virus scanner as they can miss stuff, also a spyware and adware scan wouldnt go a miss.

:beer: russ

Actually some of the free anti-virus programs are better than the ones you pay for lol

Claireylvsad_2

yeah I have used AVG free in the past and it is good, but all my programs keep on crashing and can't seem to resolve it so just want to start over :-D

superscaper

You should be backing up anyway. I.e. if your hard drive were to suddenly physically break (has happened to me so it does happen) would you lose anything important permanently? If the answer is yes then you're not backing up properly.

mdbarber

superscaper wrote: »

You should be backing up anyway. I.e. if your hard drive were to suddenly physically break (has happened to me so it does happen) would you lose anything important permanently? If the answer is yes then you're not backing up properly.

not only does happen but without a doubt will happen, hdd's are mechanical so use will result in wear causing eventual breakdown
if your really lucky, the hdd will be gone by the time it breaks but probably about the same statistics as winning the lottery

tom9980

Step 1 - Install AVG free 8.0 update it and do a full scan allow it to remove any viruses etc.

Step 2 - Install Avira Antivir free and update and do a full scan.

Step 3 - Move all your files to the second hard disk as mentioned.

Step 4 - If your laptop has a CDRW or USB flash drive backup important files to a cd so you have an independant backup, as mentioned by others its important to have a backup of things like college/uni work its easy to break or have a laptop stolen always plan for the worst!

Step 5 - make sure you know where to locate drivers for your laptop might be a good idea to download them before doing a reinstall, best place to look is manufacturer's website. Also make sure you have your Vista product key handy.

Step 6 - Reinstall Vista choose to format the C drive during the reinstall.

Step 7 - Install a free virus scanner, anti malware software and CCleaner again update and do full scans.

Step 8 - Reinstall all your programs.

superscaper

tom9980 wrote: »

Step 1 - Install AVG free 8.0 update it and do a full scan allow it to remove any viruses etc.

Step 2 - Install Avira Antivir free and update and do a full scan.

Ummm you shouldn't be installing more than one antivirus at any one time.

DatabaseError

How does the OP know they have viruses, if you have used a virus scanner (avg) without problems, you probably haven't, if the scanner flags/reports, it generally cures!? reads to me more a case of tidying up the system, bit of spyware and toolbar removal, ccleaner, edit whatever vista's version of msconfig is, bob's your uncle.
scooters original advice is still pretty good, a clean install every year or so can breath life into a system