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    Anyone done a format/clean OS install/new HDD?

    Discussion in 'Acer' started by Smashy, Aug 17, 2006.

  1. Smashy

    Smashy Notebook Consultant

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    I'm going to replace my HDD, and was wondering if anyone has experienced using the Acer recovery disks to install a fresh Windows XP.
     
    Smashy, Aug 17, 2006
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  2. adinu

    adinu I pwn teh n00bs.

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    Its a simple install of the OS, nothing fancy, has been done many many times.

    Just ask any specifics u might have about the process, otherwise ull get the same answer as above.
     
    adinu, Aug 17, 2006
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  3. Tokuman

    Tokuman Notebook Evangelist

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    Get all your drivers you will need before reinstalling. I had that problem for a windows 95 and it took me about a week to get all of the drivers from random sites that mostly didn't work XD
     
    Tokuman, Aug 17, 2006
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  4. Smashy

    Smashy Notebook Consultant

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    Sorry, I guess I didn't make it clear that I'm looking to see if anyone has done it with the Acer recovery disks. If they included a Windows XP cd, then I would be 100% confident, but they give out their Acer disks supposedly with Windows somewhere in those disks. I haven't been able to find it while browsing the disks, so I would be going into this on the ASSUMPTION that it will work.

    I prefer to KNOW what will happen rather than assume that it will work.
     
    Smashy, Aug 17, 2006
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  5. Arla

    Arla Notebook Deity

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    The recovery disks should take you back to "factory fresh" a new (or different) hard drive SHOULDN'T impact this, now it really depends on exactly what notebook you have, and exactly what the hard drive is... however since you are replacing the hard drive, shouldn't be huge, replace it, play around, see what happens, worst case scenario you have to plug the old hard drive back in.
     
    Arla, Aug 17, 2006
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  6. lkowal

    lkowal Notebook Enthusiast

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    Yes........I have done it.........upgraded my aspire 3000 from a 40 to an 80 gig drive...........just switched harddrives and booted with recovery disc one.

    Piece O cake.........make sure you remove notebook battery before switching out harddrives.
     
    lkowal, Aug 17, 2006
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  7. Smashy

    Smashy Notebook Consultant

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    Thanks for the tips. Did you get to clean install Windows XP, or did you have to go to factory settings? One should be able to just install XP I hope..
     
    Smashy, Aug 17, 2006
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  8. kr4ey

    kr4ey Newbie

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    Yes. I have but not with new HDD. Insert Recovery CD and boot to CD.
    I repartitioned the whole hard drive to one drive. The recovery CD will work,
    but you will not be able to use eManager's recovery option. I use Acronis
    True Image anyway so I never used it . You may want to save your
    activation file (wpa.dbl) in the system32 folder just in case you have problems
    reactivating. I have one big 60gb partition instead of 3 partitions.

    Rick
     
    kr4ey, Aug 26, 2006
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  9. LecterUK

    LecterUK Notebook Enthusiast

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    kr4ey when reformatted and used the recovery CD, wouldn't it have reformatted your HDD in FAT32 rather than NTFS as the eRecovery console only works with FAT32 file system?
     
    LecterUK, Aug 27, 2006
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  10. Hipopanonamous

    Hipopanonamous Notebook Enthusiast

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    I have used the recovery cd that I created using acer software. I have the 5672.

    It works great, (cannot remember how long it took) but unfortunately it converted the hd back to fat32. So I ended up doing a fresh install anyway.
     
    Hipopanonamous, Aug 27, 2006
    #10