trailboy

have you ever considered running portable applications? here you have a good definition of the concept and nice list of portable apps: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_portable_software have a look at this site: http://portableapps.com/ and this one as well http://www.portablefreeware.com initially designed to run from a flash pendrive, portable applications can also run from your hard drive. if you have them stored in a partition different from where your OS is, you will be able to reinstall windows and not loosing any application/setting. most of these portable apps are modified normal programs and will store their settings in the folder they reside. the links above will only point to freeware applications, a google search will point you to programs like photoshop, nero and many many others! i currently use a combination of unattended windows intallation, imaging software and portable apps. rebuilding my system takes less than 10 minutes... (after of course a one off long and tedious initial configuration of the OS and the very few not portable applications) give it a try, you won't be disappointed. trailboy