I am rebuilding a PC after many years of running a pentium 4. Most years I have just upgraded parts but now its time for an almost complete new build. I bought a new mobo, PS, case, mem and vid card, as well as an Intel I5-750. I am planning on re-using my existing hard drive, and sound card. Do I really have to re-format and re-load XP all over again, or can I just update bios settings on the initial post bootup? I know the best thing, but is it also a requirement for the new systm to run? Thanks for your help. I have learned a lot about the current state of tech by reading your great comments.

I am rebuilding a PC after many years of running a pentium 4. Most years I have just upgraded parts but now its time for an almost complete new build. I bought a new mobo, PS, case, mem and vid card, as well as an Intel I5-750. I am planning on re-using my existing hard drive, and sound card. Do I really have to re-format and re-load XP all over again, or can I just update bios settings on the initial post bootup? I know the best thing, but is it also a requirement for the new systm to run? Thanks for your help. I have learned a lot about the current state of tech by reading your great comments.

Yes a reformat is without a doubt is recommended.The only question is what are you reformatting with, XP 32-bit or XP 64-bit?If this is a new Intel I5-750 build and you are using 4GB of RAM or more you