I reformat and install Windows XP (home and pro editions) for my family and friends. Many times over the last few years, probably 40% of the time, which must be about 30 times, after I have installed XP, even with SP2 I find that when I turn it on and click on some of the Icons (eg Outlook Express or Dial Up connection) nothing will happen. I will then click on the icon again and still nothing. Then after about three minutes the programmes will open up. Pending on how many times I have clicked on one Icon it could open up numerous times. It does not hang on some programs (eg Adware); but it will on most including My Computer, IE,OE, Dial Up to name a few. It cannot be the Windows disk as they all have their own with the appropriate keycode and it cannot be the PC as they are all different. Also one of my friends downloaded SP2 from the Update site and this has caused the same problem on his pc............it hangs for about 3 minutes. Usually as time is not always on my side, the only way I have found how to sort it out is to reformat it and install again..............sometimes it cures it othertimes I have to do it again. I have checked in Processes and it appears nothing unusual running there. I wonder whether anyone else has come across this problem and could give any assistance or advice Many thanks

There are many reasons that could cause the install to fail. XP in itself is the stablest OS that I have used but you have to follow the correct proceedures for installations...period. Unlike 98 where you could just pop into dos and sort it out, or whatever you want, Xp used a vertual dos to protect the operating files from being corrupted by the the operator and so as to make it more user friendly and more safe. In doing so it caused driver files to be extremely sensitive and uncompatable in itself, which in turn caused unfavorable reviews. A catch 22 situation. As with all previous versions there were a lot of glitches that had to be ironed out and while some of them may have been slow in comeing M$ and a lot of outside techies worked hard on solving these issues.... but no one bothered to look at the effects of how fast technological advances would in itself, in fact be the cause of some of these issues. As it turns out technology itself is the major cause. When XP was first on the drawing board, clock and cpu speeds where not thought to be a problem, and that is where it dwells now. Xp was designed to be installed through CD- Rom and at the curent read/write speeds that were common. These speeds along with cpu and clock speeds have multiplied so fast that no one could possibly keep up. And alas neither could XP. With that being said, one should be able to see where following proceedures would be paramount. But very seldom do they. Its a fast fast world and no one wants to slow down and everyone looks for shortcuts. At the last count, I have installed XP and XP Pro on 432 computers personally. 8 of them gave me pure hell till I finnally figured it out and it was also a major issue in 98, 98se, me, 2000 and NT. Other than compatability issues with hardware, the main cause of failed installations is TOO FAST OF A CD-ROM, CD-RW, DVD or whatever is used to install with. Pretty simple in itself but no one wants to be caught backing up. For the past 200 or so installations I have used an old but true 8x read CD-Rom to install with and always maintained the basic hardware prior to installation and switched them after install. Other than malware/spyware/virus issues, Non, repeat, NON of these sytems have come back with messed up file or driver systems, or failed to install on first try. Comments are welcomed. IN THE MATTERS OF STYLE, swim with the current; in matters of principle, STAND LIKE A ROCK

As a follow up, let me add that not all drives will cause this problem. Those higher end drives have better read/write capabilities and better lasers and opticals than most of the lower and middle class drives have. But how many top of the line drives do you see installed on a typical home base computer that was just bought off the shelf. By the way this also cleared up a lot of hal problems and lock ups on first reboot. But don't taker my word on it. The problem now is finding an older/slower drive or being able to access the drive to slow it for preinstallation. IN THE MATTERS OF STYLE, swim with the current; in matters of principle, STAND LIKE A ROCK

Thanks for your comments (greatly appreciated) I cannot disagree with anything you said and I found it very interesting. Since then I have been trying to determne what is causing the problem and on this PC I have detected it is the McAfee Virus Scan 7 that is causing it to hang. I have removed it and everything is OK.........reintalled and it hangs. I have tried this process numerous times and it is definetly the Virusguard. So now I am googling and trying to find out what the solution is