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joshisstoned
Motorcycle Enthusiast


Registered: 05/24/09
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How to restore a laptop?
#15199651 - 10/09/11 10:14 AM (12 years, 7 months ago) |
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How can I restore my laptop to it's original functional capacity. It's a Dell inspiron. I normally took it to the tech dept at the university but I graduated.
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imachavel
I loved and lost but I loved-ftw



Registered: 06/06/07
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whhhhhhaaaaaaaa
original functional capacity? what is wrong with it? have you tried last known good configuration?
you know, if I made a post saying "how do I restore my car to it's functioning capability so I can get to work?" you'd PROBABLY want just a FEW more details
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I did not say to edit my signature soulidarity! Now forever I will never remember what I said about understanding the secrets of the universe by paying attention to subtleties!
I'm never giving you the password again. Jerk
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joshisstoned
Motorcycle Enthusiast


Registered: 05/24/09
Posts: 3,544
Loc: Ohio
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Re: How to restore a laptop? [Re: imachavel]
#15200761 - 10/09/11 02:32 PM (12 years, 7 months ago) |
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Ok, well I backed up all of my docs and music and picture on an external hard drive.s. How would I wipe it clean and reinstall aol, iTunes, etc. Without losing my data. Last time I had it done my iTunes didn't recognize the computer and I lost all my music.
I just want to wipe it clean as it was when I got it. I'm trying to install reasons music program and I need space and my computer still has half the memory used even after getting rid of all my files.
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eve69
--=..Did Adam and ...?=--



Registered: 04/30/03
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Is it Windows? If so then right click on computer/manage/disk management and see if you have just the one partition that is the root. Sometimes some trojans and viruses create a separate partition and suck up alot of disk space. If that happens then you should download a partitioning program and reformat the bogus partition and reabsorb it into the main one.
But you didn't give us many facts for helping you. You're sort of like the person who says, hey what's the little button up in the top corner of my computer screen?
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magicbastard


Registered: 03/18/05
Posts: 791
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Whats the size of your Laptop's hard drive and the amount of RAM (Memory) in your computer?
Minimum system requirements for Reason is 2 GB of hard drive space and 512MB of RAM. If your having issues meeting these requirements, it may be time to look into investing into a new PC.
If you are still interested in restoring your Laptops OS, you can use Restore disks that may have come with your laptop or if you didn't get a recovery disk, your laptop may have a recovery partition stored on the HDD, which has several ways of accessing.
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CosmicJoke
happy mutant



Registered: 04/05/00
Posts: 10,848
Loc: Portland, OR
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I'd suspect that the laptop either came with a recovery partition, in which case during boot you'd want to pay attention to the splash screen and look for an option (likely an F key) to boot from the partition to restore, spam that key until it boots --- or, you have the option to create a recovery DVD through some software Dell included with the computer.... You'd need to find and run that software and have a blank DVD or two on hand, and then boot from the 1st DVD.
-------------------- Everything is better than it was the last time. I'm good. If we could look into each others hearts, and understand the unique challenges each of us faces, I think we would treat each other much more gently, with more love, patience, tolerance, and care. It takes a lot of courage to go out there and radiate your essence. I know you scared, you should ask us if we scared too. If you was there, and we just knew you cared too.
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imachavel
I loved and lost but I loved-ftw



Registered: 06/06/07
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Re: How to restore a laptop? [Re: CosmicJoke]
#15203468 - 10/10/11 12:54 AM (12 years, 7 months ago) |
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http://www.pctechbytes.com/dell/dell-system-restore/
http://helpdesk.its.uiowa.edu/windows/instructions/reformat.htm
those restore partitions aren't always set to automatically backup your data though. but you said you have everything backed up on an external hd. so then yeah call the laptop manufacturer and first make sure the backup partition contains the operating system with no need to reactivate. good luck, report back
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I did not say to edit my signature soulidarity! Now forever I will never remember what I said about understanding the secrets of the universe by paying attention to subtleties!
I'm never giving you the password again. Jerk
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koraks
Registered: 06/02/03
Posts: 26,729
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Re: How to restore a laptop? [Re: imachavel]
#15203851 - 10/10/11 03:54 AM (12 years, 7 months ago) |
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iTunes sucks ass in terms of reinstalling your system. iTunes alone is a reason why you wouldn't want to start taking those measures, although there are ways to import an iTunes database after a fresh reinstall. Read up on that BEFORE you start though.
Other than that: simply backup your data, put in a Windows or Linux cd/dvd, remove all partitions using the windows/linux installer and install the OS on a new partition. It's not that hard.
Alternatively, you can clean out the existing installation, but often, this is more time consuming than reinstalling, plus you're unlikely to get back to the performance level of a fresh installation since it's virtually impossible to restore an existing Windows installation to a 'clean' state.
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CosmicJoke
happy mutant



Registered: 04/05/00
Posts: 10,848
Loc: Portland, OR
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Re: How to restore a laptop? [Re: koraks]
#15203937 - 10/10/11 05:05 AM (12 years, 7 months ago) |
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I personally would do a clean install with a retail Windows disc (if in some bizarro alternate reality I ran Windows), as these laptops come with all sorts of bloatware junk software... However, being that the OP seems inexperienced, this is not the recommendation I would go with. A Dell will not come with a retail disc, and he'd have to obtain the correct version through some other means. Also, depending on the version of Windows, he very well may not even have wired LAN OOTB. He'd want to look up the model of his laptop on Dell's Support/Drivers page for his version of Windows, and download all the appropriate drivers and back them up. Lastly, when activating, there's a good chance the code on the back of the laptop will fail, since these are pre-installed from the factory by an OEM, in which case he'd have to do a phone in activation, which is a nuisance... There is software, however, that will back up your activation and the oem's product key and reinsert it in the clean install, saving you an unnecessary call...
As for iTunes, the biggest thing is backing up all your media... The nuisance is the absurd time it takes to import a large library into iTunes.
-------------------- Everything is better than it was the last time. I'm good. If we could look into each others hearts, and understand the unique challenges each of us faces, I think we would treat each other much more gently, with more love, patience, tolerance, and care. It takes a lot of courage to go out there and radiate your essence. I know you scared, you should ask us if we scared too. If you was there, and we just knew you cared too.
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joshisstoned
Motorcycle Enthusiast


Registered: 05/24/09
Posts: 3,544
Loc: Ohio
Last seen: 9 years, 9 months
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Re: How to restore a laptop? [Re: CosmicJoke]
#15205780 - 10/10/11 02:54 PM (12 years, 7 months ago) |
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Thank you cosmic. That's the answer I was hunting for.
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