Dell Restore disks

[Don Phillipson]

I must sort out a friend's Dell Dimension 2400 PC,
WinXP, thus plan to Restore from either the WinXP
or Dell (Symantec) restore disks, both brieflly and
incompletely described in the Dell manual.

Does anyone know
1 whether either Restore disk processes ProductID
(or Activation) numbers automatically (as you might
expect for bundled Dell software)
1 whether one can reformat completely without
losing ProductID or Activation numbers.

For simplicity's sake, I prefer to reformat C: but have
no prior experience installing XP. The question is
whether either Restore routine (MS or Dell) is fully
automatic, including ProductID etc., or requires data
I would lose if I repartitioned and reformatted first.
(Symantec will not tell me, referring me to Dell, the
Dell web site does not say, and Dell accepts emails
only from the USA.)

 

[Jim]

I must sort out a friend's Dell Dimension 2400 PC,
WinXP, thus plan to Restore from either the WinXP
or Dell (Symantec) restore disks, both brieflly and
incompletely described in the Dell manual.

Does anyone know
1 whether either Restore disk processes ProductID
(or Activation) numbers automatically (as you might
expect for bundled Dell software)
1 whether one can reformat completely without
losing ProductID or Activation numbers.

For simplicity's sake, I prefer to reformat C: but have
no prior experience installing XP. The question is
whether either Restore routine (MS or Dell) is fully
automatic, including ProductID etc., or requires data
I would lose if I repartitioned and reformatted first.
(Symantec will not tell me, referring me to Dell, the
Dell web site does not say, and Dell accepts emails
only from the USA.)

I recently restored the OS on my Dell 4600 using the provided Dell CDs.
It all went without a hitch, but I did read the fine manual first.
It does take some time to go through all of the steps and reload everything.
In my case, I spent a couple of days, but I was not trying to set any
records for speed of installation.
Jim

 

[DL]

A complete restore to factory condition deletes all partitions & prepares
the HD prior to reinstalling.
No format or other process is required, other than ensuring any data backups
are actually useable.
And that any internet downloaded installation files are also backed up

 

[Don Phillipson]

I recently restored the OS on my Dell 4600 using the provided Dell CDs.
It all went without a hitch, but I did read the fine manual first.
It does take some time to go through all of the steps and reload

everything.

So we take it the manual pp. are complete, i.e. Dell Restore
routine requires no key number input by the installer.

 

[Jim]

everything.

So we take it the manual pp. are complete, i.e. Dell Restore
routine requires no key number input by the installer.

No, we should take it that we follow the instructions given by Dell, because
they are quite complete.

For example, when the installations says "Press any key to boot from the
CD", Dell's instructions say, "Do not press any key". I don't know what
happens if you ignore this instruction, and I do not want the know..
In addition, when the installation gets to the place where you are supposed
to either register the computer or not, select "Not at this time" (Dell
registered it at the factory)

In addition, Dell instructs you to install the chipset drivers, etc, after
the installation completes. Lots of people overlook this essential step.

 

[Don Phillipson]

No, we should take it that we follow the instructions given by Dell, because
they are quite complete.

For example, when the installations says "Press any key to boot from the
CD", Dell's instructions say, "Do not press any key". I don't know what
happens if you ignore this instruction, and I do not want to know..

Sorry but I do not yet see where to obtain these Dell
instructions. The are not in the Dell Manual (pp. 43-44 on
the Dell Restore app) which reads quite simply and says
the Restore process takes 6-10 minutes.

These instructions nowhere include mounting the Dell CD.
They read as if factory installation puts all the software
onto the hard drive (in hidden Dell partition.) We shall
find out tomorrow whether "Do not press any key" is a
screen prompt.

 

[Jim]

Sorry but I do not yet see where to obtain these Dell
instructions. The are not in the Dell Manual (pp. 43-44 on
the Dell Restore app) which reads quite simply and says
the Restore process takes 6-10 minutes.

These instructions nowhere include mounting the Dell CD.
They read as if factory installation puts all the software
onto the hard drive (in hidden Dell partition.) We shall
find out tomorrow whether "Do not press any key" is a
screen prompt.

You are talking about rebuilding the system using the restore partition.
I am talking about install the system using the XP CDs. (I thought this was
what you were doing). My Dimension 4600 does not have a restore partition.
Those are two very different processes.
My Inspiron 6000 has a restore partition all right, but I chose not to use
it because it would take me so long to clean out all of the software that I
do not use.
Instead, I restored the system from a backup that I had made using ATI.
Jim