Heh, heh. A pretty good chuckle on the "pleasures" of installing an operating system at How to install Windows XP in 5 hours or less [dive into mark]
A Verity Stobb article on Cruft in Dr Dobbs Journal, is similar in spirit. Rather than detailing the installation steps, she talks about the steps a computer goes through to require a reinstall.
One interesting allusion she makes is that cruft applies to all operating systems. I must say, for all the operating systems I have worked with ranging from DOS, VM, OS/VS, MVS, OS/2, all incantantations of Win, Linux and most recently Mac OS X, cruft happens. And it eventually requires a reinstall.
However, thinking further, it could be argued that cruft is not a state of the computer, but rather those who use it. I must admit, that my clothes drawers are not neatly laid out and that there is clutter around the house. I wonder if there is a correlation between those who are fastidious by nature and the cruftidity index of there computers?