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[ Go to January 1997 Table of Contents ]
Letters
Two readers seemed genuinely shocked by the prospect of routinely formatting their hard drives (Letters, November). It may seem extreme, but formatting your hard drive does more than clean the slate. It builds your confidence so that you can fix just about any blunder on your machine. After my first several disasters, I learned that formatting wasn't any big deal, just a little time-consuming. Seth Weiser via the Internet As a PC repair guy, I see nothing but Windows 3.1, 95 and NT machines swamped with applications and cursed with an arthritic OS. I totally agree with Mike Elgan that every half-year, average users should wipe the slate clean and reinstall their software from a freshly formatted hard drive. There are too many bits and pieces of uninstalled and poorly upgraded software clogging up Windows' arteries. You might hate to do it, but I can guarantee that there are definite benefits. For instance, it's a great time to download the latest drivers for your hardware, and you can recover a lot of space by not installing apps that you rarely used. You can strip out all sorts of dirt and grime this way, just like a machine shop rebuilding an engine. Dennis Chang via the Internet Copyright © 1997 CMP Media Inc.
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