Okay so I bought a student media version oem winxp pro from my university's computer store for $70 (kinda funny how I spent a lot of time trying to get a winxp off ebay and almost won, but then discovered that there's one available right here and for much cheaper lol). So anyway I want to use this to replace my currently cracked version of XP (wipe my windows partition and do clean install). I want to retire from the stormy life of pirating and buccaneering micro$shaft *takes off pirate eyepatch* and settle down with my very own legit copy of windoze . That way I'll also be able to do updates without any worries. Soo anyway, here are some questions: Am I gonna have to reinstall my motherboard drivers?? Right now what I have in my add/remove programs list is an entry that says "NVIDIA Windows 2000/XP nForce drivers". But are they essential? U don't need a driver for your processor, so what are these for? Are they for my LAN card maybe? My MoBo does have an integrated LAN ... it's an asus a7n8x btw. Secondly, since I'm wiping only the partition with windows and all my other system programs on it, most of my games are staying. Is it bad that they're no longer in any way "registered" in the registry after the reinstall?
To be honest Id just reinstall everything if you are planning on formatting the partition with windows on. Some games and programs will run OK without registry entries but the registry is there for a reason. As for your motherboard drivers, id definatly reinstall them. I keep all the dics I need for a reinstall in one place that way its a simple matter of wading through the disc. It makes the process a bit quicker than otherwise.
You'll need to reinstall most of your software as they will no longer be registered with the system. You won't need the drivers to actually start your system (apart from SATA drivers if you have a SATA HD). But once you've installed the system, you'll want to install the various drivers for your hardware to help it work better.
