Well what company hard drive you have? I had a IBM one 40GB came with my DELL. It had similar problems like u. THen it just wouldn't start up. So Dell came in and gave me a new one. That broke also. Reformated Broke again. Looked inside also IBM. WTF! So don't get IBM hard drives. My idea for u is get 256MB more MB then go ahead and give yourself something good. Get XP. Or forget that and Reinstall ME or 98. But maybe consider getting a Maxtor or Seagate or Western Digital OR anything other than IBM.

BTW how nessesary is it that I defrag my drive? COuld it screw things up or is it only good.

#2 Should I install my Norton Anti Virus 2002?

and #3 Wouldn't reformating mean reinstalling everything? I have like 10GB of videos and roms and ISOs and Music and images and docs and I don't feel like burning it all on CD just so I can reformat. Is there an easier way or should I just not reformat every year. Sorry I talk so much. It's just that I know how it feels to have the worst comp it the whole world. Cause that's what I have/had.