Strategies for making frequent reinstalls painless

[Kibokun]

I'm one of those lazy people who may never reinstall their OS unless some major failure calls for it. I want to break that habit and start doing it more often for the significant speedup it generally provides.

I've got a number of things installed that I really wouldn't want to re-download and install every time. Steam games, IDEs, etc.

What are some tools/utilities I can use to make this process something painless to do maybe once a month?

On a separate, but related note, my Win7 is on a volume license from my former university, so if I need to re-activate after a reinstall, I probably wont be able to, so some way to retain that activation would be great.

 

[Automata]

If you are not attending that university, you shouldn't be using their volume license. Since that would violate their TOS (and be immoral), we can't discuss how to bypass that here, sorry.

You can simply move your Steam folder to another drive and then back after the install. It does not require you to install the client or download each game. I've been doing this for years and I've never had an issue.

Besides that, you could do a fresh install of the system, install applications and configure them how you want. Then, use a disk imaging program to get an image of the hard drive and you can restore that whenever you want to the hard drive. No reinstall required. The downside is that image is static. You would have to install new programs or updates after you restore the image unless you recreated it each time. If you don't mind putting money down for a program, Acronis was good when I used it a few years ago. If you want something free, Clonezilla works great.

Honestly though, I'd just flatten it after 6 months and do a clean install. Imaging is nice and convenient, but I can't see a system slow enough after a month to warrant a reinstall.

 

[nooster]

there are plenty of neat utilities around that will allow you to customise your install environment.

if you have a legitimate copy and key (i.e. you have a store bought copy not a volume lincense as thidy said we cant endorse bypassing dodgy copys here) you can use programs such as Nlite or Vlite, to customise the elements that you want to install, and it will even alow you to slip steam service packs and some programs so that when you riun the installer, it will also install the programs that you want.

as a example, i have a custom install disk for my windows 7 ultimate, that i have stripped out stuff that i will never use, things like remote desktop and microsoft error reporting to name a few. i have also added in customer UI features, and programs like firefox into the install making it completley unatended install that is a few gigs smaller than the bloated full version.

search around on the net for ideas on what you can do. google is your friend.

 

[Kibokun]

If you are not attending that university, you shouldn't be using their volume license. Since that would violate their TOS (and be immoral), we can't discuss how to bypass that here, sorry.

You can simply move your Steam folder to another drive and then back after the install. It does not require you to install the client or download each game. I've been doing this for years and I've never had an issue.

Besides that, you could do a fresh install of the system, install applications and configure them how you want. Then, use a disk imaging program to get an image of the hard drive and you can restore that whenever you want to the hard drive. No reinstall required. The downside is that image is static. You would have to install new programs or updates after you restore the image unless you recreated it each time. If you don't mind putting money down for a program, Acronis was good when I used it a few years ago. If you want something free, Clonezilla works great.

Honestly though, I'd just flatten it after 6 months and do a clean install. Imaging is nice and convenient, but I can't see a system slow enough after a month to warrant a reinstall.

Re: the license: Understood. I will just buy an OEM copy soon to avoid any potential issues. I figured I was still allowed to use the license since I obtained and installed it as a student.

Retaining my steam games was probably my biggest concern. I was not aware you could do something like simply move them. I can move the entire folder, including client files without issue? Or just /steamapps?

I think I will give the disk imaging utilities you mentioned a try. Having that around on maybe a flash drive would be ideal.

Thanks

 

[Automata]

You can literally move the entire steam folder. Additionally, you don't even have to reinstall the steam client. Once you copy it to the new install, simply run Steam.exe and it will reinstall missing registry keys. It is very slick. If you play WoW, it does the same thing.

If you want an easy way to install those utilities/ISOs onto a flash drive, use YUMI. I've been trying to get bootable flash drives to function at work to make my life easier and this tools makes it incredibly easy. Select ISO, hit launch, boot flash. In the 3 days I've had a bootable flash drive, I've used it over 100 times between work and home.

 

[ebug122]

I would recommend something like TeraCopy to move your Steam folder. It gives you a better visual of what is being copied and has (in my experience) been much faster than regular Windows cut and paste. It also has some level of error recovery if something happens in the middle of a file transfer.

 

[mbentley]

If you want something that is really painless, just take an image of your hard drive after you have everything installed. Given that this will not keep your steam folders and profile up to date, it completely negates the need to do an actual installation of Windows and going through all the updates which is what I find to be quite annoying; more than reinstalling applications themselves.

 

[Dermen]

With Win7 I think there is less slow down over time. Every time I've reinstalled I've not been able to notice a difference in speed like I used to with XP. However, I still end up reinstalling at least every 6 months so my OS never gets really old.

 

[c627627]

Partition hard drive. Install multiple OS, for example Win7 on one partition, WnXP on the other. The simply reboot from one OS to the other and image one OS from the other.


Install only small apps on OS partition. Install large applications on a separate partition. For example, for a dual Win7/XP boot instead of installing them to C:\Program Files and D:\Program Files where C: and D: are where OS's were installed, install large applications to E:\Program Files and E:\Program Files XP folders - leaving the OS partitions smaller for faster reimaging.

Keep the image files on separate hard drive.


http://neosmart.net/download.php?id=1
Scroll down to where it says Non-commercial Free &
use any Name & Email to Download

 

[Metlcub]

I keep a 8gig usb drive set with all my drivers and programs. Even if the program is outdated, it'll update itself after install. This way when I install win7, it's plub in USB and install everything from it, boom, done..

 

[BenF]

You could also look into winpe and imagex. I also second that once a month is WAY to often. I don't see how you could screw up your windows install enough in one month to warrant re-imaging your computer.

 

[c627627]

One month is the bare minimum. Reimage > Install monthly windows update > New image.

I keep changing the image, but I definitely nuke my Windows more than 12 times a year. I would go 100% if didn't do it. Everything little detail is just as you want it to be all the time if you do it like that.



And it takes only a few minutes to reboot from one OS to another and image one OS from another. There's even faster ways to do it by using a specially made CD instead of booting from one OS to another. It is faster for me to nuke Windows than diagnose a problem. If Windows so much as hickups - I immediately blow up the OS partition and reimage it.

 

[EarthDog]

If you want something that is really painless, just take an image of your hard drive after you have everything installed. Given that this will not keep your steam folders and profile up to date, it completely negates the need to do an actual installation of Windows and going through all the updates which is what I find to be quite annoying; more than reinstalling applications themselves.

That then take incremental backups in the meantime would help keep it updated. But yeah, +1 on system images. I suggest Acronis True Image Personally.

If Windows so much as hickups - I immediately blow up the OS partition and reimage it.

 

[c627627]

Since I moved Desktop and all other customizable data away from OS partition, why not? If Windows can be reimaged to be as fresh as the day you installed it, there's no downside to nuking and replacing it - if it can be done and finished by the time you come back from a short bathroom break... and it can!


In the past 10-15 years, a couple of months is the longest I've ever gone without reimaging Windows, as soon as I notice that something is a fraction of a second slower than instantaneous... boom.

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