Annoyance: pre-installed installers

[mas90]

I just bought a new laptop (actually the same model as my old laptop - HP 2510p - for reasons which make sense only to myself). On first allowing it to boot, the factory installation underwent the following steps:

1. Boot Windows XP and start the usual first-run wizard (slightly customised such that it forgets to offer you the chance to create a non-

Comments

[gerald_duck]

This is nature's way of telling you that you should buy from a manufacturer that gives you the vanilla install CD for your OS and a CD full of drivers, so you can build sanity from the ground up instead of having to remove the insanity.

[mas90]

They do, in fact, ship a CD and a DVD containing two different versions of Windows and two DVDs (!) full of drivers. But I shouldn't have to use them when Windows comes preinstalled...

[gerald_duck]

If there are more than 9.4Gbytes of drivers, you may have already lost.

[mas90]

Well, "applications and drivers" for two versions of Windows (hence the two discs). I haven't yet unpacked them to see what's actually included or how full they are. I'm hoping that most of the space on the discs is taken up by Microsoft Office or something similarly large and non-essential.

[asobala]

That system tray is very funny :)