Thank you for being a valued part of the CNET community. As of December 1, 2020, the forums are in read-only format. In early 2021, CNET Forums will no longer be available. We are grateful for the participation and advice you have provided to one another over the years.

Thanks,

CNET Support

General discussion

Easiest way to clean install Win 7

Jun 29, 2010 2:23PM PDT

I installed Win 7 Upgrade when it first came out several months ago. It's about time to clean out the hard drive and reinstall Win 7. What is the easiest way to do a clean install.

Initially, I had to hunt down a lot of Win 7 64 bit drivers because they weren't available from the manufacturers when Win 7 first came out. Is this going to be an automatic process this time, or am I going to have to visit the manufacturers websites and download the correct drivers?

Thanks

Discussion is locked

- Collapse -
Since you said Win 7 Upgrade
Jun 29, 2010 7:08PM PDT

This would mean the initial installation would have required a qualifying OS such as XP or Vista. What did you have and how did you do the installation? A clean installation is always going to need the appropriate drivers and it's probable that some have been updated since you did the first installation. You'd need to create a list of what hardware you have and acquire those drivers. There's not much that's automatic. With the clean installation, Win 7 will be doing a lot of patches to itself but you don't want to use it for driver updates.

- Collapse -
Yes, you'll have to find drivers
Jun 30, 2010 2:47AM PDT

By doing a clean install, you are wiping your computer and starting clean meaning you will need to find drivers for 64-bit Windows 7 once again. Windows will automatically get drivers for you, but inevitably you'll need to search for drivers as well.

Maybe instead of doing a reinstall, you can do some of the things found here http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows7/Optimize-Windows-7-for-better-performance to clean up your computer and get better performance from Windows 7.

Cheers,
Cassandra

- Collapse -
Clean install of Win 7
Jun 30, 2010 11:58AM PDT

Actually, I just had a problem with my HP printer and had a replacement sent. I went thru the reinstallation of the printer. When I go to the control panel, it shows the printer as the only printer. However when I try to print from some of the programs I use a lot (Quickbooks, Outlook 2007, etc) the drop down Printer menu shows about 2-3 different HP printers. I'm guessing that the old drivers have not been deleted when I reinstalled the printer. I have not been able to find out how to delete the old drivers so I only show one HP printer when I go to print. I figured this might be a good time to just do a clean install of Win 7.

- Collapse -
Two ways to deal with this
Jun 30, 2010 7:23PM PDT

You should be able to remove an old or invalid printer by doing a right click on it from control panel/devices and printers. Select the option to remove it. If you actually have more than one printer that you use, you can also, using the right click, set it to be the default. Windows will (should) automatically use that one when you go to print unless you manually select another.