The thing that annoys me about Windows is the reinstalling, especially with XP - like one slight hitch on a PC with a single HD and it's a case of wiping the PC totally. I know there's people sitting waiting to say 'you should just...' - but I just can't see why it has to be as bad as it is.
I mean, it's not rocket science to ensure a backup of the registry - windows does this already but it means nothing if it can't be used in a reinstall. Same goes for any setting on your PC - I see no reason why all this stuff should be as disposable as M$ makes it, it's like they love you to reinstall their OS.
It's like Dell, you buy a PC from them with a 160gb hard drive, and you get a single formatted drive at about 145gb - nice size, shame about your personal files when your OS goes south. But, if they partitioned the drive, they'd have all sorts of idiots complaining about only having a 20gb drive C when they ordered 160gb. If I went to fix a PC and it was partitioned sensibly then I'd be so happy, it would save me so much time and trouble. This is the thing, fair enough if Longhorn needs to repair itself now and again, but if it's anything like XP when it comes to re-installations they can keep it.
My little brother installed a beta of Longhorn, within half an hour he had told me he wasn't too impressed, that says one thing to me: My little brother is not the best person to test this stuff.
Van-B