Resolved Best way to restore a laptop?

My daughter has been using a Compaq C700 laptop that has a recovery partition on the harddrive. I gave this laptop to her several years ago. She didn't keep up with the updates on AdAware, Spyware Blaster, AVG, CCleaner, but whenever I asked, she stated that the laptop worked just fine.
It is running 32bit Vista premium, and before I gave it to her, I created the recovery CDs( 10 of them).
She gave me the laptop a few days ago, stating that it is running very slowly.
I tried running the Eusing registry cleaner-which would always lock up after getting about 80% of the way through. I defragged the harddrive, removed Adaware, SpywareBlaster, and some other Yahoo related programs. This helped to speed up the computer somewhat, but it is far from fixed. It is still very balky in response to touchpad clicks, starting up, and shutting down.
I haven't connected to the internet, as it states that there is something incompatible with my wireless router and the laptop. I'm pretty sure I can connect through an ethernet cable, but haven't tried yet and am at the point where I think it's best that I just restore the laptop.
She doesn't appear to have too much on there that is valuable. Still, I wonder which method of recovery would be least destructive and preserve her documents, music, etc. The HD is a 120gig. 10 of that is the recovery partition, and the 110 remaining is about 50% used. It was 65% used before I began deleting programs.
So far, I've run CCleaner, and was going to connect and run a MalwareBytes scan after connecting to the web. I did finally run the registry cleaner all the way through after identifying which subsection was causing the hangup and unchecking it so that the program would ignore it. I also used msconfig to uncheck some start up programs.
How would you folks proceed?

 

Stick the disc in and go from there if you want to do what your subject line says. Then go get all the M$ updates and the rest of the programs that you want on it. Probably quicker in the long run to do it that way. Of course if there is anything on there that needs saving, do it. Things like Pics. Favorites, e-mail addys etc.

PS
Registry cleaning tools are not usually recommended. They can make a boat anchor out of a PC pretty quickly.

 

Thanks Mr Bill. I'll get a hold of my daughter and see if there is anything on there that she needs to save.
The reason I posted this was is that in the past, I seem to recall that restore disks gave you the option of destructive and non-destructive restorations. I think it was an ACER cd set, but I'm not sure.
I just don't want to start down a road from which there is no return.
I'll let you know how it goes.

 

Like the old saying, it is better to be safe than sorry.

 

I'm in the process of copying her documents folder to an external USB drive.
I purchased this laptop in used condition. As I mentioned, I then made the backup disks sometime later. I wonder if it wouldn't be better for me to use the recovery partition instead of the CDs.
That would get me to a point that the laptop was when it first left the factory or store. As it is now, there are folders on the laptop that have the previous owner's name.
No big deal, unless the backup CDs are somehow better than the recovery partition. This being Vista, I have no access to the previous owner's folders, so I cannot delete them.
I think that would be cleaner, don't you think?

 

The restore CD's should let you name it what you want and it should be like it was from the factory.

 

Well, the laptop restore went without a hitch-though not without the aggravation of having to remove the bloatware. I'll mark this thread as closed or resolved.
I'll be posting a request for recommendations for good anti-virus/malware/protection software in the appropriate forum. The laptop had AVG 9.0, AdAware, SpywareBlaster.
I wonder if that is still the latest and greatest freebie that I should install or if there is something newer or better out there. I'm with Comcast, so I use their free Norton Suite.
My daughter is with Charter, and obviously didn't care enough to keep up with the updates for the 3 or 4 programs that I had installed 4 years ago or so.
Thanks, Mr Bill for your kind inputs.

 

Glad you got r dun... Look at my signature as this is all I have on my PC's for protection. Of course, no protection is worth a plug nickel unless it is kept up to date. Why don't you set MS updates to install automaticly. Then that is one thing you won't have to worry about. LOL