Can't get xp to run smoothly for eight months

I really need help........ever since I have had xp all I seem to be doing is trying to keep it running smoothly without blue screens, phisical memory dumps, crashes etc... At first it was fun trying to troubleshoot and fix but now it's just plain annoying and I want to relax. I tried to put win 98 back a few times but it won't detect my modem which I know is fine and working. All my hardware and software is xp comp and i allways update windows. Sometiomes I think it's the way I partitioned my c and d drives which are now nfts or I think my computer thinks I have two operating systems running. The reason I say this is because when I re-boot and the black screen that asks what operating system I want to use instead of one win xp it lists two. When I click on the second win xp it says I need a certain file to make it work and the other one starts xp normal. My memory is 37% utilized total physical memory 256 mb and total windows memeory 999 mb, hard disks 9.41 gb and 1.19 gb. ANY ADVICE would be appreciated.





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Was this an initial install or an upgrade from another OS?

Are you in a position to be able to backup any data files, email address book, favorites, etc. to somewhere off the PC and do a fresh install of XP?

And do you have XP-Home or XP-Pro?

 

It started up as an upgrade and then I did a fresh install about 5 times. I used e-z install a couple times to save some stuff and then I started saving everything on cd's. I have xp home