Windows on borrowed time

[seeker1]

I have been having a problem with crashes since I tried to update the video driver to the most current stable driver for XP. But, thinking about this today, I couldn't remember if I had uninstalled the original driver before the update, so I proceeded to start over. Everything went fine on the uninstall, and apparently during the reinstall of the driver. But, then the computer crashed again, as it had in the past. After several failed attempts to reboot, even using safe mode, I went into Linux while I pondered the situation. I was thinking of reformatting, but I decided to try once more first. This time it worked...at least for the time being. I'm not really certain what question(s) to ask, because I fail to see a path to aim for. I'm think of just copying my important files to another drive before going ahead with the reformat, but decided to write this in hope that someone might have a better suggestion?

 

[RealBlackStuff]

That's your best bet, reformat and reinstall.
Before you do, make a new XP-CD with SP2 slipstreamed into it. Saves a lot of time.

http://www.theeldergeek.com/slipstreamed_xpsp2_cd.htm

 

[seeker1]

While I admit that I didn't read every word from the link that you gave, it appears that this procedure would only be needed if I didn't already have a bootable CD of Windows SP2...but I do. Did I miss anything?

 

[RealBlackStuff]

I only confirmed that format/reinstall was your best bet.
Most people still have the 'old' plain XP, hence my advise for slipstreaming.
So much the better if you have it already.

And no, you did not miss anything.
But you could check the components such as memory, properly seated cards and cables, dustbunnies, non-working fans, a harddisk that is at the end of its useful life, a PSU that is too weak or slowly dying, etc.