There is an article in computer magazine that a subscribe to Maximum PC. It appears in the Feb 2009 issue cover title "Give Windows a Clean Start." They have a good article on making a clean install of the operating system. May be a little technical but easy to follow.

OS drivers should not be an issue if you install to an HP. I have had three HP computers in my life and the windows update installs the drivers just fine to boot the system. Once you install the OS the first time most drivers will install but any remaining drivers should install when running windows update the first few times. (Of course this is assuming your network driver installs.) You may need to go to the HP website support and type your model number into the search. The site will list any drivers that you need to manually install along with any extra HP software that may be useful. For example I have a fingerprint reader on my laptop that needs a manual install of the drivers. HP makes it relatively painless. By performing a base install of the OS from Windows install disk you can tailor the desktop to avoid the OEM clutter that typically comes with a preinstalled OS.

As Bert mentioned, imaging software is great and I would image the first time you complete the OS install and software base prior to putting data and setting it up.

Overall this is not as hard as it sound. Once you do it you will think that was really nothing. You will gain a better appreciation of what is going on at the OS level and how programs work and how their installation can affect the system. The only caveat is how much time do you have to spend? If your time is limited then you may need to outsource. This process is not necessarily difficult but can be time consuming.

Geoff