You could burn the ISO file onto a DVD if you have a DVD drive in your laptop. Otherwise, go the USB route.
Did you try the ‘recovery’ disc you created before your old drive died?
I should have clarified about how to use an .iso image file. You can’t just copy it onto a DVD-R, you have to open it with a program like ImgBurn which can then convert the iso image file and burn it onto a DVD-R disc creating a fully bootable Windows install DVD.
Immediately after a use of a restore partition that wiped his data, I would be more prone to believe its a flaky drive.
An .iso file is kind of like a zip file. It needs to be “unzipped” onto the disc. If you just copy the .iso to the disk, it’s like just copying the .zip file rather than the files inside the zip. You need a special program which can unpack the .iso and then layout the files on the disc so they are back like real files.
Are you able to open the disc on another computer? If so, do you see lots of individual files or a single .iso file?
Looks like I’m up and running.
I apparently didn’t do a very good job creating the restore disc.
Here is what I ended up doing: Once the restore didn’t happen, I removed the new drive, put the old one back in, and made another restore disc. Once again took out the old drive, put the new one in, launched the disc and crossed fingers. It worked flawlessly.
Took all evening to get things customized and in order. Internet access, bookmarks, anti-virus, programs installed, and 146 Windows updates.
I think it was an actual hardware failure vs. malware. chkdisc showed bad sectors that were un-repairable. Also, the warning windows directed me not to buy something but to go to Windows System Backup.
Anyway, I am grateful for all the guidance.
mmm
Glad you got it working. 99.9% of the time there’s a hardware failure with a computer it’s the hard drive (it’s the only moving part*!*)