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1. Check out the Windows Logo’d Product List site or the Windows Vista Compatibility Center site, or run a compatibility report by using the Check Upgrade utility provided with Windows 2000 Professional or the Upgrade Advisor for Windows XP or Vista, depending on which OS you’re planning on installing. These utilities generate a detailed list of potentially problematic devices and applications. You can run the utility in both 2000 and XP as follows: Insert the Windows Installation disc and, from your current OS, open a command prompt or use the Start Run dialog box to run the WINNT32.EXE program with the CHECKUPGRADEONLY switch turned on. The command line will look like this: d:\i386\winnt32/checkupgradeonly (where d: is the optical drive).

2. Have an up-to-date backup of your data and configuration files handy.

3. Perform a “spring cleaning” on your system by uninstalling unused or unnecessary applications and deleting old files.

4. Perform a disk scan and a disk defragmentation.

5. Uncompress all files, folders, and partitions.

6. Perform a virus scan, and then remove or disable all virus-checking software.

7. Disable virus checking in your system CMOS.

8. Keep in mind that if worse comes to worst, you may have to start over and do a clean installation anyway. This makes step 2 exceedingly important. Back up your data!

The Windows 2000/XP Clean Installation Process

The steps involved in a clean installation of Windows 2000 Professional and Windows XP are virtually identical. The only differences are the order of two steps and some of the art on the screens that appear, so we can comfortably discuss both installations at the same time.

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NOTE Not all screens in the installation process are shown!

A clean installation begins with your system set to boot to your optical drive and the Windows installation disc in the drive. You start your PC, and assuming you have the boot order right, the installation program starts booting (Figure 14-4). Note at the bottom that it says to press F6 for a third-party SCSI or RAID driver. You only do this if you want to install Windows onto a strange drive and Windows does not already have the driver for that drive. Don’t worry about this; Windows has a huge assortment of drivers for just about every hard drive ever made, and in the rare situation where you need a third-party driver, the folks who sell you the SCSI or RAID array will tell you ahead of time.

Figure 14-4 Windows Setup text screen

After the system copies a number of files, you’ll see the Welcome screen (Figure 14-5). This is an important screen! As you’ll see in later chapters, techs often use the Windows installation disc as a repair tool, and this is the screen that lets you choose between installing Windows or repairing an existing installation. Because you’re making a new install, just press ENTER.

Figure 14-5 Welcome text screen

You’re now prompted to read and accept the EULA. Nobody ever reads this—it gives you a stomachache when you see what you’re really agreeing to—so just press F8 and move to the next screen to start partitioning the drive (Figure 14-6).

If your hard disk is unpartitioned, you need to create a new partition when prompted. Follow the instructions. In most cases, you can make a single partition, although you can easily make as many partitions as you wish. You can also delete partitions if you’re using a hard drive that was partitioned in the past (or if you mess up your partitioning). Note that there is no option to make a primary or extended partition; this tool makes the first partition primary and the rest extended.

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NOTE Many techie types, at least those with big (> 500 GB) hard drives, only partition half of their hard drive for Windows. This makes it easy for them to install an alternative OS (usually Linux) at a later date.

After you’ve made the partition(s), you must select the partition on which to install XP (sort of trivial if you only