I recently bought a new HP Windows 8.1 laptop. It is much faster than my old one which was Windows 8.1 also. I want to give my old one to a family member but need to reinstall windows 8.1 with my recovery disks from the new one. My old recovery disks don’t exist. Is that possible to just do a recovery to the old computer from the recovery disks from the new computer? Both are Windows 8.1.
Probably not. Most recovery disks are tied to a specific computer model and won’t install or may not properly configure a different model. They basically copy an image instead of doing a true windows install. Many actually check the computer model before proceeding with the recovery install.
You can usually order recovery disks from the manufacturer for a small fee (I think it was something like 10 bucks the last time I had to do it for a neighbor). Some of them have iso files that you can download and burn yourself.
ETA: Are you sure you need a physical disk for the recovery? Many laptops these days have a hidden partition on the HD that they install the recovery from. All you need to do is boot into the BIOS and select recovery (or whatever it happens to be labeled as, often restore to factory defaults or something like that) from there.
like he said, the “recovery disks” usually just contain a bootable cloning utility. The actual recovery image is on a hidden partition of the hard drive. When you “recover” or restore the system, you boot from the utility and it simply copies the recovery image to the system partition.
desktops too can have the hidden recovery partition (which may not apply here).
Agreed.
Additionally, even if you managed it, you would have two computers with the same license for Windows. That is illegal (whether you get busted for it is a different question but it is still illegal).
I understand you are not trying to break the law and that you own two copies so in some sense you are “legal” with this but as these things go this is breaking the law.
Will you get busted? Probably not but don’t point to this in court as your defense if you find yourself there.
Hello Robcaro,
Two options here, as stated above use the recovery partition or download a clean copy of Win 8.1 from MS, burn to a DVD and boot from that.
Both have advantages, the first isn’t dependant on an internet connection, but you will need to bring it up to date with MS Update.
OK, as a fail safe find and make a record of your Windows serial number, if it’s not on a sticker on your device then use belarc;
which will find it for you.
Next, immediately after power on press F8, this should lead you to some fairly obvious options, please ensure you have made a copy of anything vital from your old machine.
Be patient and remember that this will restore your PC to it’s original state which may well be windows 8, not 8.1 so prepare for lots of updates. You’ll also restore all of the manufacturers bloatware, mostly extraneous and performance sapping junk so you might want to run Decrapifier:
Second option, downloading win 8.1 and running a clean install, is a more satisfactory but slightly longer winded approach, as Fibonacci said don’t really have the space here but it’s readily searchable.
If you have anything that might be compromising on the hard drive please be aware that most everything can be recovered from a hard drive, given time. There are methods, multiple (20-40) overwrites but takes a hell of a long time and not absolutely guaranteed.
I digress, use option one and remember the fun and games you had taming your first Win 8 machine,
Peter
In windows 8.1, if you go to the start screen and type “recovery” (no quotes), about the third option down will say “remove everything and re-install windows”
Click that and follow the instructions. You will be asked if you want to just remove your files or securely wipe them. Up to you on that one but the secure wipe can take a long time.
If the computer was originally Win 8 that was upgraded to 8.1 it will be reverted back to 8 and you will have to update, update and probably update again and then go to the windows store to upgrade to 8.1
Thank all of you very much.
While you are in recovery mode, consider making actual physical recovery discs. HP gives you that option from the recovery console and makes it very easy.
That way, if and when the hard drive dies and the serial # has been rubbed off the sticker, you can just install a new hard drive and have physical media from which to install Windows (serial-free, I believe - the serial is embedded for you).
Otherwise it costs $30 to get new discs sent to you, I believe.