Want to do a FULL SYSTEM RESTORE

[Guest]

I want to restore my PC to when i got it from the Factory, so how can i do
this? Thanks..

 

[Ted Zieglar]

Ask the manufacturer. They provide the means to do this and will give
you exact instructions. You may also find the instructions in the user
manual that came with your computer.

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

I want to restore my PC to when i got it from the Factory, so how can
i do this? Thanks..

That depends on what computer you have and what they supplied you. OEM
vendors are required by their agreement with Microsoft to give you a means
of reinstalling, should it be necessary. They can do this in one of three
ways:

1. An OEM copy of Windows
2. A restore CD
3. A hidden partition on your drive, with restore information.

If you don't have 1 or 2, you should have 3, but you should contact your
vendor to find out.

If the answer is 2 or 3, you need to read your documentation or contact the
vendor to find how to it. It's their own special procedure, not a Windows
one, and it takes place outside of Windows.

However if you have an installation CD (number 1 above), it works like a
retail CD. Just boot from the Windows XP CD (change the BIOS boot order if
necessary to accomplish this) and follow the prompts for a clean
installation (delete the existing partition by pressing "D" when prompted,
then create a new one).

You can find detailed instructions here:
http://michaelstevenstech.com/cleanxpinstall.html

or here http://windowsxp.mvps.org/XPClean.htm

or here http://www.webtree.ca/windowsxp/clean_install.htm

However why do you want to do this? In my view, it's usually a mistake. With
a modicum of care, it should never be necessary to reinstall Windows (XP or
any other version). I've run Windows 3.0, 3.1, WFWG 3.11, Windows 95,
Windows 98, Windows 2000, and Windows XP, each for the period of time before
the next version came out, and each on two machines here. I never
reinstalled any of them, and I have never had anything more than an
occasional minor problem.

It's my belief that this mistaken notion stems from the technical support
people at many of the larger OEMs. Their solution to almost any problem they
don't quickly know the answer to is "reformat and reinstall." That's the
perfect solution for them. It gets you off the phone quickly, it almost
always works, and it doesn't require them to do any real troubleshooting (a
skill that most of them obviously don't possess in any great degree).

But it leaves you with all the work and all the problems. You have to
restore all your data backups, you have to reinstall all your programs, you
have to reinstall all the Windows and application updates,you have to locate
and install all the needed drivers for your system, you have to recustomize
Windows and all your apps to work the way you're comfortable with.

Besides all those things being time-consuming and troublesome, you may have
trouble with some of them: can you find all your application CDs? Can you
find all the needed installation codes? Do you have data backups to restore?
Do you even remember all the customizations and tweaks you may have
installed to make everything work the way you like? Occasionally there are
problems that are so difficult to solve that Windows should be reinstalled
cleanly. But they are few and far between; reinstallation should not be a
substitute for troubleshooting; it should be a last resort, to be done only
after all other attempts at troubleshooting by a qualified person have
failed.

If you have problems, post them here; it's likely that someone can help you
and a reinstallation won't be required.

 

[Guest]

I have my factory recovery disk but I formatted every thing before I ran it
and now Ive lost D/ drive (recovery) and now my emachines (5 months old) is
wacked!!! Ive been able to boot up and reinstall some drivers but it gets so
many error codes and crashes I might as well throw it in the trash. So be
careful!!!!