Problems when I tried to do a system recovery with Vista

[Fred Seaman]

I have an Acer 9410 laptop with Windows Vista and I had taken it to computer
techs to fix some mouse pad problems as well as some startup freezing
problems. They said it passed their PC check so didn't appear as anything
was wrong. They said I could try to do system recovery to restore it back to
its factory settings. Well, when I initially tried it, it didn't work so
then, not thinking this through and not being as familiar with this as I
would like to have been, I accidentally rand the Anytime Upgrade CD thinking
it was also the recovery CD. Of course, I found out after the fact that it
was just that, so it reinstalled another version of Vista on my computer
which then completely wiped everything including the Acer emPowering
Technology software which contains the software to do the system Recovery.
But it also removed some of my original drives like the memory card drivers,
microphone, and maybe the webcam. In the process it saved a bunch of old
Windows files to my hard drive. Are those still useful and is there any way
I can recover those drivers besides getting the recovery CD's which I can
purchase from Acer or the store where I bought it from for around $40.

 

[Rick Rogers]

Hi,

If it moved everything to a windows.old folder, then you stand a chance of
recovering the original installation, see:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/933168

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
My thoughts http://rick-mvp.blogspot.com

 

[Fred Seaman]

Ok, so far I got through Step 1. When I started reading Step 2 thats where I
run into an obstacle. I don't have the installation disc. All I have is the
Windows Anytime Upgrade disc.

 

[Rick Rogers]

Hi,

See if this helps:
http://neosmart.net/blog/2008/windows-vista-recovery-disc-download/

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
My thoughts http://rick-mvp.blogspot.com

 

[Fred Seaman]

I'm going to try that, but one more question, How do I know if I had the 32
bit or 64 bit before since there are both versions provided? And I want to
use the one for the previos OS right?

 

[Rick Rogers]

What does your disk state on it?
Which version did Acer preinstall?

A year ago, it would have likely been 32-bit, but 64-bit is becoming more
common now.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
My thoughts http://rick-mvp.blogspot.com

 

[Fred Seaman]

I bought it almost 2 years ago. I didn't get an original disc, it came
preinstalled. The current version of Vista that I have now is 32 bit. But
this is the one that replaced the original version.

 

[Rick Rogers]

Then that's the one you'd want to use.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
My thoughts http://rick-mvp.blogspot.com