Hi Chadwick,
there are two sorts of people. Those who have lost data and those who are going to. Delay entry to the last group before doing anything exciting, but remember emails, passwords, favourites and logons, as well as the more obvious, before attacking the lappie with a lump hammer. If you do have to reformat, (very unlikely, but) you should be ok as the manufacturer supplied restore/driver disks will remember the important system stuff. If you don't have a full ensemble of the aforesaid, then go into control panel - system and expand everything in the device tab, before printing it for safe keeping. That way, you have a record of what is fitted, should you have to go chasing drivers.
It is a good exercise, but really shouldn't be needed. However, a belt and braces approach never does any harm. It is not that I am some anally retentive pedant, (I think) but more that I learned the hard way.
Yours,
ARP (Nooooooooooo!!!!!!!)
Conan