reinstall WINDOWSxp

Yes. You need to do a repair installation.

Boot from XP CD
Continue when prompted for Recovery (Do Not Run Recovery, it will take you to Recovery Console which you Do Not want)
Once Install screen is reached (takes several minutes), you should have the option to perform a Repair Installation. That's what you want. Will do an overwrite install saving programs, added drivers, settings, and data.

If Repair Installation is not an option, abort XP installation.

For more detailed information, see the link below.

http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm

Dalton

Windows XP does not re-install over itself like Windows 98.

When you install XP over itself, it wipes out the registry and system files.
So, even though your programs are still in place, Windows will not know that they are there. They will need to be re-installed.

Your best option to keep things intact, is to perform a "repair" installation.

Boot from the XP CD, and follow the prompts to install XP.
There will be a point where you have an option for a repair installation.

Out of curiosity, what kind of problems are you having that lead you to want to install XP over itself?
There are MANY tools in XP to repair common problems.
If you have had a virus or spy-ware infection that will not go away, a FULL clean installation with the hard drive formatted may be what you need.

I've had my XP system running since November 2001 with no problems.
My W98 system has needed to be reloaded twice in the same time frame.

Chas

Its called an Inplace Upgrade.

Microsoft Knowledgebase

OS Inplace Upgrade
For Win2k Q292175
http://tinyurl.com/5za4v

For XP Q315341
http://tinyurl.com/2zgk

Lee