Installing Windows

I end up doing this quite a lot...a disk has failed, there has been a serious virus problem, or the machine has got into such a mess that it cannot easily be recovered. There are a few tricks worth having up your sleeve when reinstalling a Windows machine - but note...this is not supposed to be a complete guide to installing Windows, and there may be any number of hurdles along the way!

1. You are going to need a product key when you reinstall. This 25-character code is normally to be found on the Windows sticker attached to the machine's casing. But if it's a laptop it may have rubbed off. Before you start reinstalling, get the code! If you can't find it, it can be recovered from the machine. I keep a small program called ProduKey.exe which fetches the Windows product key.

2. When you reinstall, all the existing software is also going to need reinstalling. Make sure there is a way to do this. You will need install media and license codes. ProduKey will also tell you the code for any installed Microsoft Office products.

3. Once Windows is back on, you need to secure it as fast as possible. This involves

(i) getting the drivers for the ethernet adaptor, and installing it. Unless there is a manufacturer's CD available, you may need to use another machine and a portable disk to do this.

(ii) getting antivirus software on and updated. I keep a copy of Microsoft Security Essentials on my portable disk to save time downloading it. It will still need to update.

(iii) getting Windows updates. It saves a lot of fuss to have the Windows service packs downloaded and ready to install on the portable disk too. Once the latest service pack is on, you will still need to use Windows Update to bring things up to date.
(iv) installing all the other devices. The computer manufacturer's website is generally the first port of call here.

4. There is a mass of useful software that is needed to make a machine do normal everyday tasks. The bulk can be installed in one go by visiting ninite.com. Selecting the required packages from a list, you then leave ninite to do the work, fetching and installing the latest versions of everything with no questions asked.