What do you mean boot from the Windows XP CD? And why is
it the wrong answer to every problem?
It's almost always the wrong answer because, while it might fix things short
term, you could very easily have your problem back pretty quickly.
If, for example, your problem is hardware-related, you'll be back to the
same issue as soon as you load drivers for the device, or as soon as that
device begins to act up.
If it's a problem with some software you've installed, you're going to have
the same problem as soon as you reinstall that software.
If it's a virus or a hacker or a networking problem, those will likely come
back as well.
While the operating system can get corrupted, there are ways to fix that
without resorting to a format and reinstall. There are actually very few
things that REQUIRE a full format and reinstall, although it's often the
first thing that tech support suggests because it can fix other things by
default (for example, you don't load that buggy software back onto the
computer, or you go bet newer device drivers) and it gets you out of their
hair for quite a while as you trudge through the whole process of getting
the computer running again.
The better option would be to find out what's wrong, and fix that. Otherwise
it would be like buying a whole new car because you had a flat tire. You'd
get nice round tires with the new car, but the fix would certainly be
overkill.
