Time To Sort This Out

[Jimmy]

Well, I just spent these holidays batteling bad pc perforamce, fs fps many many houirs have been spent "testing" my fps in all manner of situations in fs, nothing has improved. I just had to cut the pwoer to my system as the "display driver stoped working"

So enough of my moaing, I now have the win xp discs. So would like to reforamat my entire system, start it all fresh. (hopefully shoudl fix my msn messenger problem ).

I have never done anyhting like this so would like the most detailed information please, dont wana stuff this up. Coudl someone please explain every step to be taken, from what stuff I need to uninstall of my pc to the starting of my sim at the very end?

I have two drives so shoudl be able to back stuff up on my sslave drive ae. I'd liek to know what to do when certain things go wrong, so prety much every possible button I may need to press. And no Im not going to take my system to a computer shop as I imagine it wont be cheap, im happy to do it myself.


Help very welcome
James

[ZK-Brock]

Yay, good stuff James!

[brownbox]

thats exactly what i did yesterday. I completely reformatted, re partitioned, and re installed windows. I backed up my downloads, and documents. Of course, I did remember to back up FS9..... oh sh*t Goodbye repaints....

[Zöltuger]

reformatting is a big deal- you'll lose everything, it'll be like having a brand new computer. so it's EXTREMELY important that you back up EVERYTHING that you have and want.
first off, backup all your important files- including flight sim, any outlook emails, address books (in .csv format), word documents, music, photos... etc. don't forget anyone else that uses the computer. also have a rummage through your downloads folder, look for installers for things like acrobat reader, firefox and winzip- back those up too and it'll save downloading them again. don't backup your program files (aside from scenery and aircraft add-ons in the flight sim folder) or windows folders, this is unecessary since we'll be reinstalling all these later.

then, put onto disk all the drivers you'll need- graphics card, sound card, printer, modem, network and any other hardware. this is a good opportunity to download the latest version of these.

if your copy of windows xp doesn't come with service pack 2 (sp2), and you don't have it on CD, then download that too. in fact, if you don't have it, get microsoft to post this to you (for free, but it takes up to 6 weeks).

when you're absolutely positively sure (no going back here) that you're ready to format, post again for the next step.

[gokanru]

It will be a good experience for you james and Zoltuger has given you the best advice.Best of luck with it

[Jimmy]

Alrighty, I have backed up all my files off the C drive and tidyed up my 30gb of fsfiles on the E drive I can't find the installers for things such as adobe reader yet I can download that aferwards ae, its not that important. AI have other installers like for msn etc.. on discs.

I currently don't have any free cds/dvds so will backing up on my slave (E) drive be ok? Thats not gana be wiped is it?

then, put onto disk all the drivers you'll need- graphics card, sound card, printer, modem, network and any other hardware. this is a good opportunity to download the latest version of these.

Hmm I havnt much of c lue what and were to get these. I think my current driver is realtek or soemthign thow, I have the cd that came with my graphics card and the modem also came with its on disc. I don't have a sound card or netowork. Can you please point me in the right direction for the drivers I need for my board? specs:

motherboard...."Micro-star international", model: MS-6533
BIOS: phoenix technoogies, version 6.00PG, Date: 01/13/2003

  It will be a good experience for you james and Zoltuger has given you the best advice.Best of luck with it

That you and thankyou very much to zoltuger

[EDIT]

I have now downloaded firefox and have a copy absolutly everything (even firefox's bookmarks )stored on the D drive. Shoudl I just remove the drive from my system now untill the reformat is done? Will removeing it keep the partition (I think thats what its called) and data will stay? Id like to just take i out and keep it safe untill after the process

So now I just needa get the drivers, will I need to put these drivers on to discs and in what way? I am not wroying about things such as adobe reader as they are such big files that can really wait I just wana get on with it....

[gokanru]

You can leave the slave drive in James because you are only going to format c:drive.when you have formatted your C drive put your xp disk in and it will boot up just follow the prompts.it may ask if you want to format c again,let it do so just to keep it happy and make sure you format using the NTFS file system,also by leaving your slave drive in you will preserve the order of the drives.Make sure that you can boot from your cdrom drive


http://www.msi.com.tw/program/support/d ... =45&kind=1

this link will take you to your drivers for your board.

[Zöltuger]

what is your current hard disk arrangement? like, do you have 2 disks with 2 partitions each? which one has windows on it, which one has FS?

[Jimmy]

I have two harddrives:

37GB-Windows, programs (the those in the program files folder)

154GB-Flightsimulator. (I now have all my files on this drive, from the my documents folder too, I have backed everythign up on here)

The 154gb drive is set as a slave drive I think, well it must be cos windows runs of the smaller 37gb drive witch was in the pc originaly, I added the 154gb one. So I suppose I can remove the 154gb one with all the backup ae

[Zöltuger]

there's not really any reason to keep in, you could take it out. just make sure it's the right one.

[Jimmy]

okay I will uninstall fs and take the drive out, I will go get some cds to put the drivers on, I just needa know what drivers to download please?? I havnt a clue what to do.

Thanks
James

[Zöltuger]

video card: from nvidia.com
modem: from whoever makes it

then using the link in gokanru's post, get the Realtek ALC Series AC97 Audio Driver and SiS® 650/650GL/651/661FX/740/761GX System + VGA Drivers

[Jimmy]

Great I have them downloading now, I have unpluged the extra power cables going to my gfx card so I can use my dvd drive again (wont damage the card not getting all the power it needs will it?).

Iv found the discs for my:

graphics car driver (the one that came with the card)
Modem driver (the cd that came with the modem)
nero
siatek driver for joystick
I have backed up the installer for firefox 2 on slave drive

So with the two drivers im downloading now were sdo I put them? Do I just unzip and put each one on to a cd?

Oh and how do I check if I can boot from cd rom drive gokanru?

[ronwestnz]

download the service pack 2 for xp as well, apply this after you install xp, this will help with some of your hardware installs

[Alex]

How large is the SP2 download again? May be a bit of a mission on dial-up...

Alex

[ronwestnz]

ah dial up dont download it then, pm me and i wuill send you a cd of it.

otherwise you'll be spending a month doing updates

[brownbox]

SP2 is approximately 250mb

[Jimmy]

The xp disc I have has sp2 on it thanks for the offer anyway ron

I have downloaded the drivers now (finaly, they just finished) and have two discs to wright them too, excacly how do I need to put the files on to the discs? Is there a particular way they need to be on there, I imagein just moving the zip file over wouldn't be a good idea

[gokanru]

You can write the zip files to disk James or store them on your slave drive.To see if you can boot from your cd rom you need to go to your bios setup.The setup is usually in this order.Floppy drive,hdd 0,cd rom,other.yours maybe different.Once you have formatted the c:drive,then the computer will look for the first available drive to boot from.Just a thought though,how do you intend to format the C drive.you can't do it with windows running,and using dos you can only format to a fat 32.if that is the case,then what I would do is boot to your desktop,and put the xp cd rom in and just do the install from there.It will tell you that you already have a system on C drive.read carefully and do your reinstall on C it will give you the option to format drive in NTFS.don't do a format with fat 32,NTFS is a superior file system and faster.If you are given the choice,do a clean install,not the upgrade.You can do this James,just read carefully.

[Jimmy]

umm okay im confused now, I thoguht I coudl chose NTFS format dring the install of xp, by inserting the cd then restarting the pc and making it boot from cd at startup..

hmm zoltuger gave me these links, I think it explains how to do NTFS:

http://www.ehow.com/how_6026_format-hard-drive.html

http://lifehacker.com/software/windows/ ... 157578.php