HiVolt
29
Premium
join:2000-12-28
Toronto, ON
clubs:
 ·TekSavvy Solutions..
| [Rant] HP Laptop + Vista + Recovery DVD
My cousin bought a HP Laptop at a local Best Buy. She hates Vista, so knowing the laptop is preloaded with it, asked me prior to purchase if I can wipe it and put her own copy of XP. I said sure, bring it after you buy it. So she drops of the new laptop today, its still sealed in the box.
I open the box, plug everything in. System starts booting, its about 7:30pm. Vista takes a good hour to do its initial setup along with HP software. Automated process except for a few entries such as username, time zone settings, etc. Finally get to Vista desktop around 8:30pm.
Knowing that there is no actual media provided, I want to create a recovery disc-set, in the event my cousing has to put back Vista in the future. So I start the HP Recovery manager. It crunches away for a good half hour, before it presents the option of how many discs of various types it will require to create the recovery disc-set. It gives an option of 17CD's, 3 DVD-R's or 2 DVD-DL. I chose to use 3 DVD-R's, so i put in the first disc and it starts "preparing files". A good hour goes by. Then a screen finally pops up, "Creating disc 1 of 3", with three steps, "Collecting files", "Writing Files" and "Verifying disc". I would estimate about 20 minutes per step, so about an hour total per disc.
It is now 10:50PM, and it has collected, written and is about 90% done verifying the FIRST DISC! Words cannot describe my frustration at this very moment, because I estimate there's still 2 hours left of this pain.
All because the companies do not ship a 10 cent recovery disc with the machine, so if someone doesn't want the Vista bloat and preloaded crapware, but still wishes to keep a copy for future use. Not to mention reclaim 12GB of hard drive space which they conveniently take up for this recovery crap.
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harryhoudini
join:2003-02-05
Los Angeles, CA
| Next time just make an image with Acronis. Takes about 20 minutes total and much better than a recovery disk. The image will have all the updated info and stuff.
If you need to restore, it will aslo take about 30 minutes or so rather than 2 hours. You will need an external HDD though. |
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Anonymous_
Anonymous
Premium
join:2004-06-21
127.0.0.1
clubs: | reply to HiVolt
it will also be an pain in the ass
to find the drivers
took me about 1 hour just to get all the drivers installed
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Underwater bogeyman continues secret mission... |
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HiVolt
29
Premium
join:2000-12-28
Toronto, ON
clubs:
·TekSavvy Solutions..
| reply to HiVolt
Well, its 11:45PM, and it's FINISHED! HOLY !@#$%^!
The creation of the last two restore discs went quicker, about 30 minutes each. The burner was spinning quicker, I could hear it. The first one was slow as heck.
Had HP provided a recovery disc, I would have not even booted into Vista, but directly to XP, would have installed it, put on drivers, the software that my cousin wanted, and would have been sound asleep by now.
Thanks HP, Microsoft for wasting 4+ hours of my life.
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GO LEAFS GO!
Don't question the authoritaaaa! |
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jadinolf
I love you Fred
Premium
join:2005-07-09
Ojai, CA
·DSL EXTREME
| reply to HiVolt
I got my Compaq laptop on Feb 25 and went thru all of that for most of the day. Took forever for me to get to play with it.
I have always built my own computers because of the programs they shove down your throat with these off the shelf computers.
I wasn't about to build a laptop. 
Oh well.
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This post printed on 100% recycled bytes |
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Thaler
Premium
join:2004-02-02
Encino, CA
| reply to HiVolt
said by HiVolt  :All because the companies do not ship a 10 cent recovery disc with the machine, so if someone doesn't want the Vista bloat and preloaded crapware, but still wishes to keep a copy for future use. Not to mention reclaim 12GB of hard drive space which they conveniently take up for this recovery crap. *shrugs* I just leave on the recovery sectors on my computers. With 100+ GB avaliable on my laptop, and 700+ GB avaliable on my desktops, I'm certainly not going to miss 20 GB worth of space.
Plus, and advantage of leaving the files on the drive - you never have to go searching for system disks. Just boot up your computer, enter the vendor's recovery mode, and ask it to reinstall (should you really need to). |
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Sweet Witch
Be the flame, not the moth.
Premium,MVM
join:2003-07-15
Gallifrey
 ·Comcast
| said by Thaler :
Plus, and advantage of leaving the files on the drive - you never have to go searching for system disks. Just boot up your computer, enter the vendor's recovery mode, and ask it to reinstall (should you really need to).
If the drive doesn't fail.
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"While you can teach an old dog new tricks, you simply can't teach him to be a cat." |
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Thaler
Premium
join:2004-02-02
Encino, CA
| said by Sweet Witch :If the drive doesn't fail. I never said it was fail-safe. I always make the recommended backup medias, but I also keep in the additional "system restore" disk segment. Of all the times I've desired to reinstall Windows at home...I'd say 9/10 times the original system HDD is still in the drive. Having that recovery segment just saves me the time of fumbling for the CDs/DVDs.
Heck, even if you do botch it up and don't make a recovery set, most vendors will send you a copy of your backup media for a few bucks, maybe plus shipping. |
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dadkins
Can you do Blu?
Premium,MVM
join:2003-09-26
Hercules, CA
·Comcast
| reply to Thaler
I burned the DVDs *AND* left the hidden partition on these VAIOs.
All of 7GB... I'll live!
Need something... no prob!
Drive(s) fry? Replace drive(s) and use the DVDs.
XP, but it's still the same principle.
Also use Acronis... minutes vs hours is a no-brainer
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Think outside the Fox... Opera |
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dvd536
as Mr. Pink as they come
Premium
join:2001-04-27
Phoenix, AZ
| reply to HiVolt
said by HiVolt :Had HP provided a recovery disc, I would have not even booted into Vista, but directly to XP, would have installed it, put on drivers, the software that my cousin wanted, and would have been sound asleep by now. Not so fast there BuBBy!
first you would have had to use killdisk to wipe that crap off the hdd[vista does crap to hdd's and only way to rid them of it is to wipe them] or XP wouldn't install. so either way to have a backup, you would have had to backup vista.
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You can never be too rich, too thin or have too much Bandwidth |
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HiVolt
29
Premium
join:2000-12-28
Toronto, ON
clubs:
·TekSavvy Solutions..
| said by dvd536 :Not so fast there BuBBy! first you would have had to use killdisk to wipe that crap off the hdd[vista does crap to hdd's and only way to rid them of it is to wipe them] or XP wouldn't install. so either way to have a backup, you would have had to backup vista. Huh? I have removed Vista from countless HP/Compaq/Dell machines and never encountered any problems, simply boot with XP Pro, delete the partition, create new one and off I go. Same with this HP laptop, though I did have to download a SATA driver and put it on a USB floppy during the initial XP setup stage, as these new SATA based laptops do not emulate SATA to IDE anymore.
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GO LEAFS GO!
Don't question the authoritaaaa! |
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Pathfinder
Dazed Confused
Premium
join:2000-03-26
Mount Vernon, NY | reply to HiVolt
Of course there is the option of spending $19 dollars more and ordering the back up media. |
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viperpa33s
Why Me?
Premium
join:2002-12-20
Bradenton, FL
·Bright House
| reply to HiVolt
I just ordered a HP Tablet and got it the other day. I paid the $19.95 for the restore disc. After I got the laptop up and running, I just deleted the restore partition. To much of a pain in the butt to create the restore discs and in my case, sometimes it wouldn't work.
There is way you can get a restore disc for free, it worked for me a couple of times. I just called up HP and told them the restore disc creation wouldn't work (which was true) and they would send me a restore disc in the mail for free. The restore disc they sent me was minus all the extra garbage software. |
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Stewy
Premium
join:2007-12-12
Kitchener, ON
1 edit | reply to HiVolt
said by HiVolt :Thanks HP, Microsoft for wasting 4+ hours of my life. I've worked for HP for a cpl of years and I have a laptop with XP. You may have another problem, a new version of XP may not even work on the laptop. Depending on the laptop version you may not even find HP-XP Proprietary drivers for the system. |
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HiVolt
29
Premium
join:2000-12-28
Toronto, ON
clubs:
·TekSavvy Solutions..
1 edit | said by Stewy :said by HiVolt :Thanks HP, Microsoft for wasting 4+ hours of my life. I've worked for HP for a cpl of years and I have a laptop with XP. You may have another problem, a new version of XP may not even work on the laptop. Depending on the laptop version you may not even find HP-XP Proprietary drivers for the system. I got XP installed with no problems on this HP dv6724ca, I found the necessary drivers. Thankfully there is not much proprietary stuff on these as you may think.
While HP did not provide many drivers for this particular model for XP, a lot of their laptops share similar components so after digging around a bit I found all the necessary stuff.
Intel Chipset - Got driver from Intel Website
Intel Graphics - Got driver from Intel Website
Intel Wireless - Got driver from Intel Website
Realtek Ethernet - Got driver from Realtek website
Realtek Audio - Got driver from Realtek website
Touchpad - Got driver from Synaptics website
56k Modem - from HP site (another laptop model page)
HP Quickplay - from HP site (another laptop model page)
HP Webcam - from HP site (another laptop model page)
Ricoh Card REader - from HP site (another laptop model page)
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GO LEAFS GO!
Don't question the authoritaaaa! |
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KickMe
join:2001-10-03
Lancaster, OH
·RoadRunner Cable
·Earthlink Cable Mo..
| reply to viperpa33s
said by viperpa33s :There is way you can get a restore disc for free, it worked for me a couple of times. I just called up HP and told them the restore disc creation wouldn't work (which was true) and they would send me a restore disc in the mail for free. The restore disc they sent me was minus all the extra garbage software. Yes, my HP restore CD would not verify that the files were written correctly and I called HP.
The tech said that it is quite common and overnighted me a restore CD - free. |
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Greg_Z
Premium
join:2001-08-08
Springfield, IL
·Comcast
| reply to HiVolt
You went to a whole lot of trouble for nothing in searching for drivers. The drivers can be found at »h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/soft···=3653383
And most of the others are loaded by XP SP2. |
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Stewy
Premium
join:2007-12-12
Kitchener, ON | I have an HP Compaq nx9600 Notebook PC with mobile ATI X300 graphics and the drivers are about 3 years old. Do you think I can find an update for the graphics... not on your life. |
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HiVolt
29
Premium
join:2000-12-28
Toronto, ON
clubs:
·TekSavvy Solutions..
| reply to Greg_Z
There's not much there. Hardly anything really. Trust me, I looked there first with the model number of the laptop.
I found the others relatively quickly, and most up to date versions too.
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GO LEAFS GO!
Don't question the authoritaaaa! |
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sailor
Merry Whatever ..R.I.P. dadkins
Premium
join:2003-10-21
Long Island
| reply to HiVolt
I recently ordered a new HP laptop ( my first HP ) and I really wasn't sure what to do when I was given the option while building the laptop to get a DVD recovery disk for an additional $19.00. I assumed they came with them ( the fact that the option said DVD threw me off as I assumed it was something optional)...After seeing what you posted I checked my order and I didn't check that box for the DVD.
So I called HP this afternoon and told the guy to include the DVD Vista OS DVD when they ship the laptop and he told me the laptop is on its way even though I haven't received the shipping email verification..After I ordered it on the 4th I received an order confirmation which including saying the laptop would be built on or before March 12th.
So I tell the guy to just send it by itself and I'll pay the $19.00 but he seemed more and more confused so I just told him to forget about it and I would order it another time. |
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