I often do a clean install of Win XP. After re-installing Win XP, I
would manually install Windows patches and device drivers; this is
time consuming. I just bought a CDRW to make the process easier. Would
it be prudent to make a bootable CD via XP's backup utility (is this
even possible?) or spend $50 for Acronis True Image 6.0? Which is more
suited for the job? Thank you.

Hi webmal-ga,
   The Windows XP backup utility only backs up important system
configuration files, plus any other files you might specify. It does
not create a true disk image, nor bootable CD's, so you will have to
use an external program for what you need.
   There are a number of drive imaging utilities available,the most
popular being Norton Ghost, PowerQuest DriveImage and Acronis True
Image. All of them will do what you require, although Acronis is
certainly the cheapest of the three, and reportedly much easier to
use. A new version (True Image 7.0) has been released. You can find
more information on the popular disk cloning programs in the following
article:
           - Backup Software
             (http://pages.prodigy.net/jdjd/backup/software.htm)

You can run a price search for True Image on Froogle:
           - Froogle: Acronis True Image 6.0
             (http://froogle.google.com/froogle?q=Acronis+True+Image+6.0&scoring=p)
           - Froogle: Acronis True Image 7.0
             (http://froogle.google.com/froogle?q=Acronis+True+Image+7.0&scoring=p)
Froogle shows a minimum price of $38.77 for version 6, and $41.30 for version 7.

  Another cloning utility, that comes highly recommended by a friend
of mine, is Novastor's InstantRecovery 4. It meets your needs (creates
bootable restore CDs, spans disk image across multiple CDs, supports
all versions of Windows), and is currently available for $31.47. You
can download a trial from here:
           - NovaStor » Products » Home Computing » InstantRecovery
            (http://www.no-panic.com/recovery/irecover.html)

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Hope this helps.
If you need any clarifications, just ask!

Regards,
Theta-ga
:-)



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Google Search Terms Used:
    "windows xp" disk image
    "windows xp" backup utility

It seems to me either way you are in fact defeating your purpose in doing
a "clean" install, either back-up will bring with it all the kinks, etc that
you lose when you format and then do a "clean" install

The "image" that I would backup would be a clean install of Win XP
with patches and drivers only i.e. the state immediately after a clean
install. I'm not going to backup any other software, the sole purpose
is to make my clean install faster. Please help, thank you.

Use whatever imaging software you want, Microsoft uses PowerQuest, our
company uses Ghost, and we have used Acronis also.

Once you have the machine the way you want it, use Microsoft's Sysprep
Utility to "seal" the image. Image the drive.

Use Barts, PE builder to create 32-bit bootable CD to load you image.
http://nu2.nu/pebuilder/

This will give you an image that can be reinstalled in minutes.

Hope this helps.
-Tim