Possible to use OEM disc to repair Vista installation?

[Marcus]

I'm going to buy a new laptop that sports a Windows Vista Home Premium
edition I persoanlly dislike.

Unfortunatelly there's no way to customize the lappy's operating system
befor buying it.

As a result, to keep costs low, I thought I could buy a separate Windows
Vista Ultimate OEM disc + license, and reinstall from scratch.

The only worry is about a "repair install" capability.

If OEM versions are suited for "clean" disks, how do you manage a repair
install? (Sorry if I use this terminolgy but that is how is called in
Windows XP, I hope it has the same name in Vista!)

Many times in Windows XP I've faced situations were it needed a repair
install...... unsure if Vista's OEM versions allow that...

Any help?

 

[Michael Solomon]

I'm going to buy a new laptop that sports a Windows Vista Home Premium
edition I persoanlly dislike.

Unfortunatelly there's no way to customize the lappy's operating system
befor buying it.

As a result, to keep costs low, I thought I could buy a separate Windows
Vista Ultimate OEM disc + license, and reinstall from scratch.

The only worry is about a "repair install" capability.

If OEM versions are suited for "clean" disks, how do you manage a repair
install? (Sorry if I use this terminolgy but that is how is called in
Windows XP, I hope it has the same name in Vista!)

Many times in Windows XP I've faced situations were it needed a repair
install...... unsure if Vista's OEM versions allow that...

Any help?

The only specific repair function in the Vista install routine is the
startup repair and that should be offered on the OEM disk as well as that is
not a full install. However, Non-OEM disks can also do an in-place install,
that is, you can install Vista over itself in an attempt to do what amounted
to the old repair install and I don't think you'll be able to do that with
the OEM disk.

However, you can do is create a few images with an imaging application such
as Acronis True Image 10. Install Vista, install the drivers, whatever you
need for a clean setup and image the system and activate it once you know
it's you want it; then, image the setup. If you run into problems in the
future, you can then simply restore this setup and not even have a need for
activation unless you've made some major hardware change that would trigger
it.

Also, if you have applications with which you usually work, you can install
those and create a second image that includes the applications or at least
your basic apps. That way, if anything goes wrong, you can restore that
image and all you then have to do is restore your data from backup.

Thos would give you two images of your setup in various states that would
save you a lot of time if something really trashes your setup. The second
image is for convenience and having the first image allows you the freedom
to update the second one as time goes on by adding or removing applications
and creating new images to accommodate.

 

[ray]

I'm going to buy a new laptop that sports a Windows Vista Home Premium
edition I persoanlly dislike.

Unfortunatelly there's no way to customize the lappy's operating system
befor buying it.

As a result, to keep costs low, I thought I could buy a separate Windows
Vista Ultimate OEM disc + license, and reinstall from scratch.

The only worry is about a "repair install" capability.

If OEM versions are suited for "clean" disks, how do you manage a repair
install? (Sorry if I use this terminolgy but that is how is called in
Windows XP, I hope it has the same name in Vista!)

Many times in Windows XP I've faced situations were it needed a repair
install...... unsure if Vista's OEM versions allow that...

Any help?

FWIW - you may or may not be aware that DELL is now selling computers
(again) with xp if that's what you wish. They also have several models
available with Ubuntu Linux.

 

[Richard]

FWIW - you may or may not be aware that DELL is now selling computers
(again) with xp if that's what you wish. They also have several models
available with Ubuntu Linux.

Go Dell...

Funny - when I thought of getting a new box - they told me - can only get
Vista - so I passed - I guess a lot of people passed - and they got the
message

 

[Charles W Davis]

Go Dell...

Funny - when I thought of getting a new box - they told me - can only get
Vista - so I passed - I guess a lot of people passed - and they got the
message

They no longer require one to purchase one of the priced anti-virus suites!