How to Reimage Your Computer

After years or even months of use, you may notice that your PC computer's performance has significantly decreased. If this is the case, you may want to consider re-imaging your system. The process of re-imaging will wipe all data from your hard drive and restore the computer's operating system to its original state. Before re-imaging your computer, make sure that all of your important data is backed up onto an external hard drive.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• PC running Windows XP
• Windows XP installation CD

1. Insert the Windows XP installation CD into your computer's disc drive.

2. Restart your PC and hit any key on the keyboard when prompted to boot to the CD.

3. Wait for the Windows Setup program to finish loading all system files and then press the "Enter" key.

4. Press the "F8" key to accept the Windows license agreement.

5. Use the up and down arrow keys to highlight the hard drive partition that you want to re-image. In most cases, this partition will be labeled as the "C:" drive.

6. Press the "Enter" key to select the highlighted partition for the re-imaging process.

7. Follow the on-screen instructions to set up your system accounts and preferences. The process of re-imaging your computer can take up to an hour to fully complete.

References

• Installing or Upgrading Windows