What drivers are not available online that you need to keep swSetup?

Don't really want to buy DVD/Rs to burn this folder or recovery CD's.

Can I not just do a fresh install and then download the drivers from the site?

What exactly is the advantage of having restore DVDs when my entire point of a fresh install is to get rid of the terrible bloatware contained in restore

 

What? You didn't believe me when I told you that you have to burn the swsetup folder? You can save it on a partition on your HDD if you don't want to buy DVDs. If you have a USB flash drive, you can save it there also.

Ok, for the dv5T, you'd probably be missing the quick touch button driver which is different than the Quick launch buttons. Also the bluetooth driver. Another is Quickplay software which works in conjucntion with the quick launch and in some cases, quicktouch buttons. Could be more. Also, what's online isn't always the lastest driver. HP has a habit of shipping updated drivers with the system then months later posting it to the website.

Just do a comparative to what's online versus what's in the swsetup folder. If you're not sure because some of them aren't labeled intutively in the swsetup folder, just open the cva files with a text editor to find out what driver it is.

As for why it is recommended that you burn recovery discs, again, it's because should you have to call HP support, it's one of the things they ususally have people do when things go FUBAR- reinstall the OS via recovery discs. What's more, it has happened to some on here, that they had their warranty support voided because of a clean install when they sent their notebook for repair or told HP support that they did a clean install.

I told you all this before. I'm not in the business of leading people astray. I guess you're looking for more opinions.

 

2.0 I don't see how they can void your warranty or how they can even tell your system has a fresh install. Can you link actual occurrences of this?

 

They are able to do it because it isn't how they sold the system to you and is not in their list of user serviceable components. User serviceable components are HDD, RAM, Battery, AC adapter, Optical drive and Wlan card. In some cases, the built in TV tuner also.

Also, that bloatware is a subsidy. SO they have a vested interest in you keeping it on your system.

As for links, that requires searching. As a hint, use the search terms, "warranty void, support void clean install." Or along those lines.

They're not the only company to do it.

 

That is pretty heinous. I mean that's like saying they can void my warranty when i play crysis and it overheats my laptop.

Also, how do I add partitions to my drive? Does Vista have it's own partitioning program?

I was thinking of deleting the restore partition because it is taking up space. Is this bad?

If I decided not to delete this partition would I still need to burn disks? Since it was already be on the drive for an easy restore?

And how would I a new partition or add to the existing restore partition to add the SWSetup folder to it?

Thank you for answering my questions by the way.

 

We all are here to learn to varying degrees. Some choose to learn the easy way, some the hard. We try to steer towards the easy way as best we can.

 

I guess my question put simply is...

1) Do I bother keeping the restore partition? Do I have a choice?
2) How easy is it to make a partition for the SWSetup file, so I can format and fresh install Vista but still have those files on my computer on a safe partition?

 

By the pure fact that you've started so many threads on this topic...

1) Don't do anything. Just use the laptop.
2) Pay someone else if you want anything special done.

 

Not quite the same thing. If you play Crysis and it overheats, that's on them.

Anyway, Vista has the same partition method as XP. Control panel/Admin tools/disk management.

Once you burn the Restore Discs, you can delete the partition.

If you keep the restore partition, you can get away with not burning the discs. But it is generally better to burn the discs anyway in the event of HDD failure. It does take a while. More than an hour to burn them. So whenever you get some downtime, like when you're watching TV, think of that as an opportunity.

Lastly, it would be a good idea to offload the swsetup folder in the event of HDD failure. You don't want to be caught short.

 

there's a difference between learning the easy way, and just plain not paying attention to what has been said over and over and over before. how do you partition, what size is the recovery partition? these are simple enough to find out without asking twice.. heck,, if you search the internet, you may even find the answer to a question that's already been answered... oh wait,, that would make to much sense.

 

It's actually quite sensible. While you may know what you're doing, many do not. It would increase the cost of customer service to support the acts of the less informed, for everyone. Just try to imagine the CS call and how it would go.

Joeknownothing: HI, I can't get my wireless to work.
HP CS rep: Open the HP wireless assisstant.
Joe: The what?
HP: start menu, then HP wireless assistant. It comes with the computer.
Joe: Oh yeah, I don't have that.
HP: It comes installed on the computer. Try to...
joe: Yeah, I installed a fresh copy of winodws...

See? Otherwise HP would have to train Techs to be real troubleshooters who do not run off scripts. The bloat is there also to make their setup more user friendly. So you have to understand and appreciate that. They're trying to accomodate everyone. Those of us who know what we're doing and the risks, are also smart enough to know how to protect ourselves by informing ourselves on what to and not to do and say.

Why is it BS? They give it to you on your harddrive. Even more convienient. Not everyone has broadband. And some of the programs and drivers are many hundreds of megabytes each. It would completely disenfranchise those who only had dial up or even low speed ISDN or DSL.

You're actually complaining about nothing. You have choices, opt for them.

Lastly, if and when you do burn recovery discs, be sure to use good media. I'd recommend HP, SONY or Verbatim (in that order) to ensure a successful burn. If you do a search, you'll find that using other media has lead to a higher rate of burn failure.

 

Formatting drives eats kittens. I liked the old Windows reinstall method:

F8/F5
copy c:\windows\deltree.exe .
c:\deltree /y c:\windows c:\progra~1
d:\setup

This Documents and Settings and Users directory non-sense has really made clean installs a bear to deal with when you're mass deploying system upgrades without drive images. This new fangled install and deal with accountname.000 because I wanted to save /garbage so ZeroCool had something to do makes me want to hack the planet.

Anyway, I've been lurking in these forums for a while and I notice you're trolling pretty hard on the dv5 you purchased. If you're so dissatisfied with the product you should probably be talking to HP, and not NoteBookreview. I'm sure their customer service representatives could escalate your call to someone in the know, to tell you what your options are. As far as the recovery partition, nearly every notebook ships with this for many years now. It's that whole, deployment image thing I was talking about. It's easier on them, and it's easier on the average consumer just to have that hidden partition to recover anything when you screw up. Do you have a desktop PC? If so, just image the drive and store it on your desktop and forget about it. When it comes to warranty service, just plop the old information back on if it's required. I doubt they'll be combing over inode numbers to see if the bit has been flipped more than twice on the partition to screw you out of your warranty. Nor will they be examining the drive platters (magnetic tunneling microscopy) to make sure you didn't format your drive. I certainly would, just to laugh at a user's lolcat browser history.

Other media suggestions: RiData, Pro-Disc, Mitsui and anything Taiyo-Yuden (sometimes TDK, other times Fujifilm, then of course random generic discs. Flip the disc over, and look for light blue color. Throw away green, that's a CNC disc)

 

And you say I am condescending.

You've just directly insulted someone and you have a foul mouth. For the love of god, please return your notebook before you kill another laptop.

 

To cut things short and simple:

1) Burn your recovery discs first. This is the thing that brings your dv5 back to life. This is what makes your dv5 a dv5. You can only burn once, so keep your discs safely.

2) Once you have your recovery discs, you are set. You can choose to delete Vista, dual-boot Vista and XP, whatever. I don't know about your area, but for me when I sent my Compaq to the centre for hardware issues they don't care whether the Windows XP installed is still stock or not.

3) Partitions can be managed in Disk Management.

4) Drivers are available at the HP site, but some of them may be for another model of dv5 (it may be for the dv5-1034tx and you got the dv5-1036tx). That's why recovery discs are important, and that's why the swsetup folder is still important. During the Windows XP era you still have to burn an additional i386 folder to get the XP installation disc, so consider yourself lucky now that you got one folder less.

 

is it really such a burden on you to purchase blank dvd discs and burn your recovery cds, or to right click on your d:\ drive and go to properties to find out the size.. it's about 11 gig to let you know. i can honestly say i've never heard someone complain so much about nothing.

 

Couldn't agree more - having a lot of questions is fine, that's what this forum is about but beligering those who try to help is going a bit far

 

I can see what you are saying. It just seems to be that the tools for an advanced user should be available.

I don't need HPNetworkng Bloatware to figure out my networking card. The Networking tool is RIGHT there in windows in the control panel.

2.0 If you dont mind me asking.

1) What program should I use to burn these disks? I guess the HP recovery program will do it all by itself right? As for the SWsetup disk I can just right click and hit burn to disk for that one as well?

2) What files in SWSetup do I actually need. I know most of it is bloatware. But which are the drivers that are important and need to be installed. There are quite a few folders in there.

And you say I am condescending.

You **** right I am condescending to people like you who try to insult my intelligence, chief.

 

Yep, but the majority of their customers are not tech savvy.

The included HP software burns the recovery disks. There's no alternative AFAIK. As for swsetup, you can right click or drag them over to where you want to save them.

Assuming that HP has kept the same format:

Drivers folder
Folders beginning with SP followed by numbers - they are more drivers
QPW - which is the quick play program
QTOUCH - quick touch
WLASST - wireless assistant. It allows independent control of wifi and bluetooth.
DRFPR - fingerprint reader software.

The rest is pretty much other software like games, slingbox, norton, Office trial, MSworks, adobe flash player, acrobat reader, cyberlink dvd suite, etc.

 

I really appreciate your civil manner 2.0 by the way thank you. Some others could learn from you.

Are all the drivers in one folder? IS that what you mean? Sorry I don't have my laptop at the moment. I sent it back in to exchange it for a better processor and screen.

QTOUCH - This is the volume/mute/play buttons ect... right?Installing this will make those buttons function and light up properly?

QPW - Do I need quickplay? It does not sound like somthing I would care about. Will it make the quicktouch buttons function incorrectly if I do not install it?

WLASST - I don't have blue tooth, will the drivers I need for my internal wireless card be available without installing this?

DRFPR - No finger print reader for me

It is mostly stuff like the free games(that yo uhave to pay for, free my *** lol), Slingbox, norton, office trial(I have office XP) cyberlink ect.. that I don't care about having.

And lastly. Vista is capable of burning folders to a DVD without any extra programs right? I haven't burned a CD/DVD in a long time. Like almost 8 years lol.

 

The majority are located there. A few are located in SPxxxxx folders.

Yes.

You will lose the Quicklaunch functionality and perhaps the soft eject. Some models need QP for the soft eject to work. It's a big program but only takes up 3 services. Two of which can be disabled. One is a QP task scheduler, the other is background transfer services. Though, I'd recommend setting the latter to manual.

Then you won't need these. Less services taking up resources. Always a good thing.

Yes. One really nice thing about Vista. It burns R/RW media as if it were a hard drive with ability to drag and drop. UDF, like NEro's InCD and Roxio's DirectCD. When you're done, it gives you the option of closing the session so it's readable in other drives. Nice and simple.

 

No personal attacks guys, keep it constructive. I had to delete several irrelevant posts.

Xythil, its best you buy a DVD-R disc and just burn the SWsetup folder. Most of the drivers can be acquired from the HP driver page. Its the bloatware/software and quickplay that can only be installed from the SWsetup folder.

 

Thanks flipfire. I am sorry for the attacks. It all started with that Gilderoy guy insulting my intelligence and telling me to give up... instead of posting for help on a forum(meant for getting help might I add)

So basically I need to burn restore disks, then burn the SWSetup Files to another DVD, put those somewhere safe.

Then I can restart with the "Upgrade your Windows Vista Experiance" disk in the drive and I can format all the drives?I will also be able to partition drives I want to partition and delete partitions I want to delete right?

I will then have a fresh install of windows vista home premium with no bloat?

Just making sure.

Drivers I know I should need are

1) Touchpad/Keyboard
2) Video Card Display Drivers
3) Sound Drivers

Other then that what drivers will I need to make sure I get?

 

Please check your HP driver page, you will see whats missing.

Personally i did a clean install of 64bit and got all the updated drivers from the HP website. The only thing i installed from the SWsetup folder is Quickplay.

 

Thank you flipfire

 

I have opened up my laptop before modded things and such and still sent it in under warrenty problems such that are their fault and they fix it for me. Hell i sent in a dv9000 that was out of warrenty under the service enhancment and they fixed my cracked screen housing for me for free and this one has been taken apart before.