A friend of mine about a new pc about a year ago which came with Windows XP Home Edition already installed, but has since been formatted before realising that it didn't come with a windows cd! The PC has a Windows XP Home Edition sticker on the base unit which has product key on it. Is there anyway of obtaining a cd from anywhere for this product key so that it can be re-installed?
New PC's without a Windows XP cd?
- Thread starter Phil_D_UK
- Start date
Many don't come with recovery media at all nowadays, certainly not if those purple shirters sold it.
They normally think that a system restore point is enough of a recovery method.
It might be worth getting a hold of a XP Home OEM CD, and see if it works. Failing that I believe that some places will sell you a set of recovery media :|
They normally think that a system restore point is enough of a recovery method.
It might be worth getting a hold of a XP Home OEM CD, and see if it works. Failing that I believe that some places will sell you a set of recovery media :|
I think many don't require recovery CDs these days as they hide the operating system on a hidden partition which they can use to restore the PC to how it was when you got it. So basically they make you call them out (money) so restore your PC to how it was originally.
Try and find out how to get in to the hidden partition, from there you should be able to restore.
Try and find out how to get in to the hidden partition, from there you should be able to restore.
It had 3 partitions, but 2 were removed and then formated a single partition, I had backed up what was on the other two partitions onto a cd. One was called Recover and the other just had the software applications and hardware drivers etc, but from the Recover folder there is no setup.exe or obvious file to do a fresh install onto the formatted hard drive
Depending on the manufacturer the information below maybe usefull:
Some manufacturers will not supply a Recovery CD/DVD, HOWEVER, there will be a partition on the Hard disk which contains all the recovery information, most likely in the form of a disk image or something similar so if at any point the Operating system goes wrong or the customer gets a virus, he/she can simply press a button when turning the computer on to restore the said image from the "hidden" partition onto the user partition on the Hard Disk and everything is working as when the computer was first purchased. Some users actually like this simplicity.
The manufacturer will often provide a program which enables you to "Backup" the "Hidden" partition onto Cd's/DVD's should any faults occur with the HDD.
The manufacturer will often prompt the user to make these discs via pop ups etc.
If the customer decides not make the backup, that is their own choice, but if the HDD develops a fault outside of warranty or the recovery partition is deleted by the user while installing another OS for example, they will need to purchase the media from the Manufacturer which seems fair to me.
Some manufacturers will not supply a Recovery CD/DVD, HOWEVER, there will be a partition on the Hard disk which contains all the recovery information, most likely in the form of a disk image or something similar so if at any point the Operating system goes wrong or the customer gets a virus, he/she can simply press a button when turning the computer on to restore the said image from the "hidden" partition onto the user partition on the Hard Disk and everything is working as when the computer was first purchased. Some users actually like this simplicity.
The manufacturer will often provide a program which enables you to "Backup" the "Hidden" partition onto Cd's/DVD's should any faults occur with the HDD.
The manufacturer will often prompt the user to make these discs via pop ups etc.
If the customer decides not make the backup, that is their own choice, but if the HDD develops a fault outside of warranty or the recovery partition is deleted by the user while installing another OS for example, they will need to purchase the media from the Manufacturer which seems fair to me.