reinstall system on Sony Vaio without formatting

[Charles P. Lamb]

How can I reinstall Windows me on a Sony Vaio PCV-RX470DS without formatting
the hard drive? The system didn't come with a standard Windows me
distribution CD. It came with a bootable "System Restore" CD which, upon
being booted, presents the user with the options of 1) reformatting drive C
and reinstalling the system and 2) reformatting drives C and D and
reinstalling the system. The Windows me serial number is on the back of the
PC case. Could I reinstall using the Windows me distribution from the MSDN
set?

Thanks,

Charles P. Lamb

 

[Guest]

System restore cds are from the oem,it was specifically designed for the
machine it came with,no others will work properly with it..

 

[John John]

Those cursed laptops and their restore disks! If you have a License
number for the MSDN copy you most likely could install it. Or possibly
you could do a "flat" install if the ME cab files are on your hard
drive. You should be aware however that reinstalling ME over itself
yields less than spectacular results to say the least. If you have IE6
it should be removed before you proceed. It is not something I would do
unless I absolutely needed to do it just to salvage files. In all
likelihood you will probably have a bigger mess than what you currently
have, whatever that mess is.

John

 

[Lee Chapelle]

How can I reinstall Windows me on a Sony Vaio PCV-RX470DS without
formatting
the hard drive? The system didn't come with a standard Windows me
distribution CD. It came with a bootable "System Restore" CD which, upon
being booted, presents the user with the options of 1) reformatting drive
C
and reinstalling the system and 2) reformatting drives C and D and
reinstalling the system. The Windows me serial number is on the back of
the
PC case. Could I reinstall using the Windows me distribution from the
MSDN
set?

Probably, but you might have better luck with the MSDN XP, since XP has far
better innate hardware recognition, and that computer is capable of running
it. You might have to track down a few drivers, especially if they are in
some kind of compressed format on your Sony Restore disk, they may not be in
a form accessible to Setup. Browse the CD and see if the drivers are
uncompressed. I found this page, it might be an idea to download some of
these drivers and updates to your D: drive before you begin.
http://esupport.sony.com/perl/swu-list.pl?template=EN&mdl=PCVRX470DS

Lee

 

[Lee Chapelle]

How can I reinstall Windows me on a Sony Vaio PCV-RX470DS without
formatting
the hard drive? The system didn't come with a standard Windows me
distribution CD. It came with a bootable "System Restore" CD which, upon
being booted, presents the user with the options of 1) reformatting drive
C
and reinstalling the system and 2) reformatting drives C and D and
reinstalling the system. The Windows me serial number is on the back of
the
PC case. Could I reinstall using the Windows me distribution from the
MSDN
set?

Thanks,

Charles P. Lamb

Just re-reading your Subject line, whatever you end up doing, you should
format C: at least. Any files you want saved copy them to D: first.

 

[Rick T]

How can I reinstall Windows me on a Sony Vaio PCV-RX470DS without formatting
the hard drive? The system didn't come with a standard Windows me
distribution CD. It came with a bootable "System Restore" CD which, upon
being booted, presents the user with the options of 1) reformatting drive C
and reinstalling the system and 2) reformatting drives C and D and
reinstalling the system. The Windows me serial number is on the back of the
PC case. Could I reinstall using the Windows me distribution from the MSDN
set?

Thanks,

Charles P. Lamb

What did Sony Tech Support have to say ?


Rick

 

[Lee Chapelle]

System restore cds are from the oem,it was specifically designed for the
machine it came with,no others will work properly with it..

That's not generally true, although it can sometimes take some convincing.
The Restore Disk, otoh will probably not work on any other pc.

 

[Lee Chapelle]

Those cursed laptops and their restore disks!

That's a Desktop model.

If you have a License

 

[John John]

That's a Desktop model.

Ok...those cursed OEM's who ship desktops with their ridiculous restore
disks! No worse than IBM F11 boxes I guess.

John

 

[Lee Chapelle]

Ok...those cursed OEM's who ship desktops with their ridiculous restore
disks! No worse than IBM F11 boxes I guess.

I hope not! Or how about Aptivas, or old Compaq laptops! I have found ways
to install default Windows on a lot of crappy OEM machines, it's just a
matter of getting the thing properly formatted and digging up the drivers.
Driverguide has a lot of them.

 

[Alex Nichol]

How can I reinstall Windows me on a Sony Vaio PCV-RX470DS without formatting
the hard drive?

If you Mean ME - Millennium edition - go and ask in
microsoft.public.windowsme.general.

This group is for Windows XP. This is different and there may be a
different answer.

 

[Charles P. Lamb]

I emailed Sony customer support. The first reply they referred me to
http://www.iq.sony.com/srvs/autoresponse.asp?id=305191 but this doesn't
descirbe the options given by the recovery CDs I have. When I pointed this
out to them they told me to call Customer Support. I called Customer
Support and was told by the recordings there was a fee for calling CS. The
recording also pointed out I could get email CS at no charge.

Charles P. Lamb

 

[Rick T]

I emailed Sony customer support. The first reply they referred me to
http://www.iq.sony.com/srvs/autoresponse.asp?id=305191 but this doesn't
descirbe the options given by the recovery CDs I have. When I pointed this
out to them they told me to call Customer Support. I called Customer
Support and was told by the recordings there was a fee for calling CS. The
recording also pointed out I could get email CS at no charge.

ow, how old is the machine? (curious)


what problem are you having with it ?

if <problem> is unsolveable you might consider backing up your data onto
cd-r or onto D: and just using the recovery CD(s) then restoring your stuff.


Rick

 

[Charles P. Lamb]

The system hangs during boot. Apparently the system is corrupt. I have
worked around the problem by removing the disk and plugging it into another
system. I then copied the data off of the disk. Now I can safely write
over it during a reinstall. I don't know the exact age. My guess is about
4 years old.

Charles P. Lamb