Reinstall 8.1

I decided that my best route to success was to throw in the towel and
reinstall Windows 8.1.

I have the "Dell Factory Backup" DVD set that I made with Dell's Backup
and Recovery, and I also have the Dell-provided "Windows 8.1 Recovery
Media" and the drivers DVDs.

Not knowing which one I should use, I contacted Dell and got this
interesting response from a "Dell TechCenter RockStar":

"If they are both DVDs then neither. Optical Drives and DVDs have issues
with the UEFI BIOS and SecureBoot.

"The set of DVDs may be burned incorrectly and there's a high chance
they won't work. These would restore factory settings including system
drivers if they worked.

"In order to accommodate UEFI and SecureBoot I recommend installing with
a FAT32 formatted USB flash drive for the GPT partition scheme, see here
Edition Windows 8.1:

"http://dellwindowsreinstallationguide.com/download-microsoft-windows-and-office/download-microsoft-windows/download-windows-8-1-retail-and-oem-iso/"

I find that a bit bizarre! I'm not supposed to use either the DVDs I
made from their backup program or the ones they sent me??? What's with
that??

Anyway, I made a bootable (I hope) USB flash drive from the instructions
on the referenced website and will reinstall from that after a good
night's sleep. :-)

On 04/30/2015 12:47 PM, Alek wrote:
I decided that my best route to success was to throw in the towel and
reinstall Windows 8.1.

I have the "Dell Factory Backup" DVD set that I made with Dell's Backup
and Recovery, and I also have the Dell-provided "Windows 8.1 Recovery
Media" and the drivers DVDs.

Not knowing which one I should use, I contacted Dell and got this
interesting response from a "Dell TechCenter RockStar":

"If they are both DVDs then neither. Optical Drives and DVDs have issues
with the UEFI BIOS and SecureBoot.

"The set of DVDs may be burned incorrectly and there's a high chance
they won't work. These would restore factory settings including system
drivers if they worked.

"In order to accommodate UEFI and SecureBoot I recommend installing with
a FAT32 formatted USB flash drive for the GPT partition scheme, see here
Edition Windows 8.1:

"http://dellwindowsreinstallationguide.com/download-microsoft-windows-and-office/download-microsoft-windows/download-windows-8-1-retail-and-oem-iso/"

I find that a bit bizarre! I'm not supposed to use either the DVDs I
made from their backup program or the ones they sent me??? What's with
that??

Anyway, I made a bootable (I hope) USB flash drive from the instructions
on the referenced website and will reinstall from that after a good
night's sleep. :-)




If the DVD's checksum is correct, then there should be no problem.


Unless the DVD is dirty or scratched it would be fine.


At any rate there could certainly be no file system corruption as would
be possible with a fat32 drive.

Alek wrote:
I decided that my best route to success was to throw in the towel and
reinstall Windows 8.1.

I have the "Dell Factory Backup" DVD set that I made with Dell's Backup
and Recovery, and I also have the Dell-provided "Windows 8.1 Recovery
Media" and the drivers DVDs.

Not knowing which one I should use, I contacted Dell and got this
interesting response from a "Dell TechCenter RockStar":

"If they are both DVDs then neither. Optical Drives and DVDs have issues
with the UEFI BIOS and SecureBoot.

"The set of DVDs may be burned incorrectly and there's a high chance
they won't work. These would restore factory settings including system
drivers if they worked.

"In order to accommodate UEFI and SecureBoot I recommend installing with
a FAT32 formatted USB flash drive for the GPT partition scheme, see here
Edition Windows 8.1:

"http://dellwindowsreinstallationguide.com/download-microsoft-windows-and-office/download-microsoft-windows/download-windows-8-1-retail-and-oem-iso/"

I find that a bit bizarre! I'm not supposed to use either the DVDs I
made from their backup program or the ones they sent me??? What's with
that??

Anyway, I made a bootable (I hope) USB flash drive from the instructions
on the referenced website and will reinstall from that after a good
night's sleep. :-)



While the iso (reset/refresh media iirc mentioned by others in this
forum) should work fine thought it does seem strange that Dell sent you
to a non-Official Windows site and a blog without Dell's trademark
published by a Dell Community member.

--
...winston
msft mvp consumer apps

philo wrote on 4/30/2015 2:06 PM:
On 04/30/2015 12:47 PM, Alek wrote:
I decided that my best route to success was to throw in the towel and
reinstall Windows 8.1.

I have the "Dell Factory Backup" DVD set that I made with Dell's Backup
and Recovery, and I also have the Dell-provided "Windows 8.1 Recovery
Media" and the drivers DVDs.

Not knowing which one I should use, I contacted Dell and got this
interesting response from a "Dell TechCenter RockStar":

"If they are both DVDs then neither. Optical Drives and DVDs have issues
with the UEFI BIOS and SecureBoot.

"The set of DVDs may be burned incorrectly and there's a high chance
they won't work. These would restore factory settings including system
drivers if they worked.

"In order to accommodate UEFI and SecureBoot I recommend installing with
a FAT32 formatted USB flash drive for the GPT partition scheme, see here
Edition Windows 8.1:

"http://dellwindowsreinstallationguide.com/download-microsoft-windows-and-office/download-microsoft-windows/download-windows-8-1-retail-and-oem-iso/"

I find that a bit bizarre! I'm not supposed to use either the DVDs I
made from their backup program or the ones they sent me??? What's with
that??

Anyway, I made a bootable (I hope) USB flash drive from the instructions
on the referenced website and will reinstall from that after a good
night's sleep. :-)




If the DVD's checksum is correct, then there should be no problem.


Unless the DVD is dirty or scratched it would be fine.


At any rate there could certainly be no file system corruption as would
be possible with a fat32 drive.

So which should I use, the Dell DVD or the ones I made?

Alek wrote:
I decided that my best route to success was to throw in the towel and
reinstall Windows 8.1.

I have the "Dell Factory Backup" DVD set that I made with Dell's Backup
and Recovery, and I also have the Dell-provided "Windows 8.1 Recovery
Media" and the drivers DVDs.

Not knowing which one I should use, I contacted Dell and got this
interesting response from a "Dell TechCenter RockStar":

"If they are both DVDs then neither. Optical Drives and DVDs have issues
with the UEFI BIOS and SecureBoot.

"The set of DVDs may be burned incorrectly and there's a high chance
they won't work. These would restore factory settings including system
drivers if they worked.

"In order to accommodate UEFI and SecureBoot I recommend installing with
a FAT32 formatted USB flash drive for the GPT partition scheme, see here
Edition Windows 8.1:

"http://dellwindowsreinstallationguide.com/download-microsoft-windows-and-office/download-microsoft-windows/download-windows-8-1-retail-and-oem-iso/"

I find that a bit bizarre! I'm not supposed to use either the DVDs I
made from their backup program or the ones they sent me??? What's with
that??

Anyway, I made a bootable (I hope) USB flash drive from the instructions
on the referenced website and will reinstall from that after a good
night's sleep. :-)

Roughly translating what the RockStar said:

"Sir, you should make a complete backup of that
hard drive, before you begin. Because apparently
I have no faith in any of the provided materials."

If the recovery partition is present on that hard
drive, it should be able to place a fresh copy of the
OS on the C: partition of the hard drive. You would
consult the user manual, to see how that is done.

If the hard drive contents were completely erased,
you'd look at your DVD set.

When you first made the DVD set, you would have
copied them with Imgburn. Converted each DVD to
an ISO9660 file. Then, if there is any future
concern about the integrity of the DVDs, you
could burn fresh ones. At the time the DVDs
are burned, the burning software should be
doing its own verify, to verify the checksum
of what was burned. Otherwise, if the burning
software doesn't verify what was done, there is
a small chance you could have incomplete images.

On my laptop, I reinstalled Windows 7 SP1. I used
a downloaded Retail DVD, matching the version ("Home Premium").
I needed the Drivers CD, as it has a video driver for
the graphics. There may not be any better version
of the graphics driver, except on that CD. I needed
to do phone activation, using the COA license key.
In the case of Windows 8, the key is stored in the
BIOS, and installation of Retail matching version,
the license aspect should be handled with no user
intervention at all.

I have no idea whether UEFI or SecureBoot are
going to cause a problem. Making a suggestion
it would cause a problem, is to suggest Dell never
tests their stuff.

Paul

.. . .winston wrote on 4/30/2015 2:19 PM:
Alek wrote:
I decided that my best route to success was to throw in the towel and
reinstall Windows 8.1.

I have the "Dell Factory Backup" DVD set that I made with Dell's Backup
and Recovery, and I also have the Dell-provided "Windows 8.1 Recovery
Media" and the drivers DVDs.

Not knowing which one I should use, I contacted Dell and got this
interesting response from a "Dell TechCenter RockStar":

"If they are both DVDs then neither. Optical Drives and DVDs have issues
with the UEFI BIOS and SecureBoot.

"The set of DVDs may be burned incorrectly and there's a high chance
they won't work. These would restore factory settings including system
drivers if they worked.

"In order to accommodate UEFI and SecureBoot I recommend installing with
a FAT32 formatted USB flash drive for the GPT partition scheme, see here
Edition Windows 8.1:

"http://dellwindowsreinstallationguide.com/download-microsoft-windows-and-office/download-microsoft-windows/download-windows-8-1-retail-and-oem-iso/"

I find that a bit bizarre! I'm not supposed to use either the DVDs I
made from their backup program or the ones they sent me??? What's with
that??

Anyway, I made a bootable (I hope) USB flash drive from the instructions
on the referenced website and will reinstall from that after a good
night's sleep. :-)



While the iso (reset/refresh media iirc mentioned by others in this
forum) should work fine thought it does seem strange that Dell sent you
to a non-Official Windows site and a blog without Dell's trademark
published by a Dell Community member.

True!

So which of the three would you use if you were me?

Stormin' Norman wrote on 4/30/2015 2:28 PM:
On Thu, 30 Apr 2015 13:47:24 -0400, Alek wrote:

I decided that my best route to success was to throw in the towel and
reinstall Windows 8.1.

Why? What insurmountable problems are you experiencing?


I don't want to go there, thank you. Let's just say it's an accumulation
of a bunch of things. :-)

Paul wrote on 4/30/2015 3:59 PM:

Roughly translating what the RockStar said:

"Sir, you should make a complete backup of that
hard drive, before you begin. Because apparently
I have no faith in any of the provided materials."

Wow! Quite an interpretation!! Since what's on the HD will be
obliterated regardless of what method I use, making a backup is not an
issue.

When you first made the DVD set, you would have
copied them with Imgburn. Converted each DVD to
an ISO9660 file. Then, if there is any future
concern about the integrity of the DVDs, you
could burn fresh ones. At the time the DVDs
are burned, the burning software should be
doing its own verify, to verify the checksum
of what was burned. Otherwise, if the burning
software doesn't verify what was done, there is
a small chance you could have incomplete images.

I never in a million years would have thought of that and I have never
seen it suggested before.

On 04/30/2015 01:21 PM, Alek wrote:
p

"http://dellwindowsreinstallationguide.com/download-microsoft-windows-and-office/download-microsoft-windows/download-windows-8-1-retail-and-oem-iso/"

I find that a bit bizarre! I'm not supposed to use either the DVDs I
made from their backup program or the ones they sent me??? What's with
that??

Anyway, I made a bootable (I hope) USB flash drive from the instructions
on the referenced website and will reinstall from that after a good
night's sleep. :-)




If the DVD's checksum is correct, then there should be no problem.


Unless the DVD is dirty or scratched it would be fine.


At any rate there could certainly be no file system corruption as would
be possible with a fat32 drive.

So which should I use, the Dell DVD or the ones I made?





I doubt it matters, try one.

If for any reason it does not work, then try the other.

Alek wrote:
. . .winston wrote on 4/30/2015 2:19 PM:
Alek wrote:
I decided that my best route to success was to throw in the towel and
reinstall Windows 8.1.

I have the "Dell Factory Backup" DVD set that I made with Dell's Backup
and Recovery, and I also have the Dell-provided "Windows 8.1 Recovery
Media" and the drivers DVDs.

Not knowing which one I should use, I contacted Dell and got this
interesting response from a "Dell TechCenter RockStar":

"If they are both DVDs then neither. Optical Drives and DVDs have issues
with the UEFI BIOS and SecureBoot.

"The set of DVDs may be burned incorrectly and there's a high chance
they won't work. These would restore factory settings including system
drivers if they worked.

"In order to accommodate UEFI and SecureBoot I recommend installing with
a FAT32 formatted USB flash drive for the GPT partition scheme, see here
Edition Windows 8.1:

"http://dellwindowsreinstallationguide.com/download-microsoft-windows-and-office/download-microsoft-windows/download-windows-8-1-retail-and-oem-iso/"

I find that a bit bizarre! I'm not supposed to use either the DVDs I
made from their backup program or the ones they sent me??? What's with
that??

Anyway, I made a bootable (I hope) USB flash drive from the instructions
on the referenced website and will reinstall from that after a good
night's sleep. :-)



While the iso (reset/refresh media iirc mentioned by others in this
forum) should work fine thought it does seem strange that Dell sent you
to a non-Official Windows site and a blog without Dell's trademark
published by a Dell Community member.

True!

So which of the three would you use if you were me?

None of the above. I would have purchased a retail Win 8.1 and wiped the
entire Dell drive after downloading the Dell hardware drivers in advance
in case they were not included in Windows 8.1.
e.g. Touchpad, lan and wifi, Function keys, chipset, etc.



--
...winston
msft mvp consumer apps

.. . .winston wrote on 5/1/2015 1:21 AM:
Alek wrote:

snip

So which of the three would you use if you were me?

None of the above. I would have purchased a retail Win 8.1 and wiped the
entire Dell drive after downloading the Dell hardware drivers in advance
in case they were not included in Windows 8.1.
e.g. Touchpad, lan and wifi, Function keys, chipset, etc.

Let me understand what you are saying.

After buying a computer with Windows 8.x installed, you would buy your
own copy of Windows 8.1 for an extra $100 or so?

If that comes on a DVD, isn't that risky for a machine with UEFI?? I
hear that such computers often do not recognize bootable DVDs.

Thanks.

Alek wrote:
. . .winston wrote on 5/1/2015 1:21 AM:
Alek wrote:

snip

So which of the three would you use if you were me?

None of the above. I would have purchased a retail Win 8.1 and wiped the
entire Dell drive after downloading the Dell hardware drivers in advance
in case they were not included in Windows 8.1.
e.g. Touchpad, lan and wifi, Function keys, chipset, etc.

Let me understand what you are saying.

After buying a computer with Windows 8.x installed, you would buy your
own copy of Windows 8.1 for an extra $100 or so?

If that comes on a DVD, isn't that risky for a machine with UEFI?? I
hear that such computers often do not recognize bootable DVDs.

Thanks.

Yes. In fact, I would also yank the original OEM drive, replace it and
install a new drive (SSD or Spinner).

Two laptops in this house (Acer and Lenovo) both with UEFI and Windows
installed from separate retail/product key 8.1 media. The Acer was
Costco purchase, the Lenovo a refurbished, both came with Win 8.0
pre-installed.



--
...winston
msft mvp consumer apps

.. . .winston wrote on 5/1/2015 6:11 PM:
Alek wrote:
. . .winston wrote on 5/1/2015 1:21 AM:
Alek wrote:

snip

So which of the three would you use if you were me?

None of the above. I would have purchased a retail Win 8.1 and wiped the
entire Dell drive after downloading the Dell hardware drivers in advance
in case they were not included in Windows 8.1.
e.g. Touchpad, lan and wifi, Function keys, chipset, etc.

Let me understand what you are saying.

After buying a computer with Windows 8.x installed, you would buy your
own copy of Windows 8.1 for an extra $100 or so?

If that comes on a DVD, isn't that risky for a machine with UEFI?? I
hear that such computers often do not recognize bootable DVDs.

Thanks.

Yes. In fact, I would also yank the original OEM drive, replace it and
install a new drive (SSD or Spinner).

Two laptops in this house (Acer and Lenovo) both with UEFI and Windows
installed from separate retail/product key 8.1 media. The Acer was
Costco purchase, the Lenovo a refurbished, both came with Win 8.0
pre-installed.

And what is the motivation for doing those? IOW, what do you end up with
that's so much more [fill in appropriate word] than what you would have
had you not done them?

Thanks.

Alek wrote:
. . .winston wrote on 5/1/2015 6:11 PM:
Alek wrote:
. . .winston wrote on 5/1/2015 1:21 AM:
Alek wrote:

snip

So which of the three would you use if you were me?

None of the above. I would have purchased a retail Win 8.1 and wiped the
entire Dell drive after downloading the Dell hardware drivers in advance
in case they were not included in Windows 8.1.
e.g. Touchpad, lan and wifi, Function keys, chipset, etc.

Let me understand what you are saying.

After buying a computer with Windows 8.x installed, you would buy your
own copy of Windows 8.1 for an extra $100 or so?

If that comes on a DVD, isn't that risky for a machine with UEFI?? I
hear that such computers often do not recognize bootable DVDs.

Thanks.

Yes. In fact, I would also yank the original OEM drive, replace it and
install a new drive (SSD or Spinner).

Two laptops in this house (Acer and Lenovo) both with UEFI and Windows
installed from separate retail/product key 8.1 media. The Acer was
Costco purchase, the Lenovo a refurbished, both came with Win 8.0
pre-installed.

And what is the motivation for doing those? IOW, what do you end up with
that's so much more [fill in appropriate word] than what you would have
had you not done them?

Thanks.

The original o/s and drive intact until I decide to dispose of the
device. No installed OEM unwanted software. Smaller footprint. No need
for OEM support since the installed o/s is full retail. The ability if
the new drive fails to have an immediate replacement drive backup that
can be inserted and up and running in less than 5 min or if desired
restored from a recent backup or cloned image.

--
...winston
msft mvp consumer apps

On Fri, 01 May 2015 19:00:03 -0400, Alek wrote:

what do you end up with that's so much more [fill in appropriate
word] than what you would have had you not done them?

'expensive' maybe the word you're looking for.