After I receive my new laptop, should I delete everything and reinstall Windows?

What is the best way to delete everything before I reinstall Windows? Should I use a program to clear my computer?

 

why? removing bloatware? try just removing it, or if you insist than make sure you get all important drivers, usually some laptops have system restore, try that... its really easy...

 

Depends on the laptop. I definitely would not clear everything and reinstall the OS on my Macbook. If you purchase from a manufacturer that excels at bloatware, then you should. Otherwise, no.

 

..Unless you have all the drivers handy. Also have to buy the real install disc and programs. Some programs that comes with the laptop are actually useful. Make sure that you can re-install the softwares you need, HP has them on a separate directory. It's just easier to uninstall the bloatwares and delete useless directories.

 

If your a power user and like to get the most of your system its a good idea.

for "average joe" it might be abit much as they might run into issues with finding all the drivers and setting things up correctly.

Id do this for 2 reasons:

1.) all these notebooks are comming with x86 vista and I really want a x64 based OS. So I got the retial version of Vista cheap the other day to plan ahead and plan to put the x64 version on (retial comes with both vs the OEM kinda stuff you get with a notebook wich only has 1 of them)

2.) as I go to install all the drivers after the fresh install, id hunt the net and make sure I have all the newest drivers instead of the stuff that comes on your disk or pre-installed. Especially with new hardware there are updates to drivers on a very regular basis that may fix major flaws or incompatablity issues.

the extra work of course comes with the added effect of no bloatware and the most streamlined system possible.

 

You are just asking for more trouble on your new laptop if you do that IMO......Just go in Add/Remove programs and start removing all the crap you dont want then install the Advanced Windows Care (AWC) program and run that--as that will clean up all the junk and clean up your registry that was left when you removed all that stuff. You puter should be ready to go.

 

On a Dell, I would.
On an IBM, I would not.

 

As others have said , it depends on your notebook model. Most business class notebooks don’t come with bloat ware, but consumer models usually do. Each manufacturer does it differently; with some you can simply uninstall them, but with others uninstalling won't do you much good.

If you decide to format and reinstall, then there is no need to remove anything, because a format will clear everything.

 

I did on a hp and never looked back.

The only problem was getting the right driver for all the hp buttons.

 

I did on my Dell and I've been happier ever since.
Tried the old uninstall route at first and wasn't satisfied.
Killed the recovery partition as well since it just includes all the same crap I had in the first place.
There was no software on my laptop in the first place that I couldn't get a better version of or didn't already own.

 

Will a Dell Latitude Laptop have much bloat ware?

 

You can opt to keep the drivers on the restore partition, although they are on Dell's site as well.

 

No. The business lines usually don't have any bloatware except necessary utilities for proper laptop functionality.

So a re-install isn't usually necessary on the Latitudes/ATGs.

 

i personally hate partitions, so i delete all partitions, full format the drive and install a fresh copy of windows, but after that i get all updated hardware drivers from the web and keep them on my USB drive or CD. There u go... clean fresh windows OS with only needed utilities and drivers.

 

I created a bootable CD with DOS 6.22, FDisk, Format, ATTRIB, ... etc on it awhile back.

I usually use it on any new PC to blow away all the partitions and permit me to start clean.

However, with my newest PC, an HP laptop with Vista Home Premium, I have not (yet) done this. One reason, of course, is that I do not have an unscathed copy of Vista, only the HP-ized version. Another reason is that Vista is new enough, or perhaps, more correctly, the vendors are behind enough, that the drivers are still a bit of an effort to collect. Finally, I don't see any reason to (yet) at least until I feel more comfortable with Vista.

I have manually removed much of the bloatware .