Operating system disc

[woodchopper]

Am upgrading my computer - the new one has the operating system pre-installed - can a copy of the operating system be put onto a disc for format and reinstall purposes ?

[ChuckFickens]

No, apart from if it's brand new, then there will often be a program that can only be run once to allow you to create a set of restore disks.

[society]

Chuck , suppose in future for whatever reason Woodchopper would need to do a 'recovery' how would that work? I mean like using the recovery disc to format the drive?

[MarkRae]

Most (but certainly not all) new computers with pre-installed operating systems supply the media as well - are you absolutely sure it's not in the packaging somewhere...?

Do you at least have the serial number? This can often be found stuck to the machine somewhere...

[chas2008]

on many PCs (especially HP) the rescue/restore system is accessed by from what i can remember the F8 or F11 key,

[squarebear]

"Your best option would be to download your desired O.S as a torrent"

I disagree, as this would be illegal.

[Old_Geezer]

That would depend on whether you had the copyright owners permission. But probably illegal.

Ideally you needed to buy your PC from a supplier who was willing to supply the o/s disks as well. Some manufacturers like to hide a partition on your hard disk and put the installation files there, but I know from experience this can corrupt, and then you are left in the lurch.

Have you tried contacting the PC manufacturer (or your supplier) and see if you can pay a small fee for the disks you could reasonably argue you should have; since you have paid for the system ?

[LeMarchand]

You could create a disc image using a "cloning" program like Drive Image XML or Clonezilla (both free, but there is a huge range of both free and commercial alternatives). Most likely you'd need an external drive or multi-DVDs to do it (and not all programs allow DVD use). I'd Google the above two to see if you feel up to it. It's not overly difficult, but not something I'd recommend for a beginner.

[Old_Geezer]

That is a thought. You can use something like Norton Ghost to create an image. But on restore it won't be a repair as such, just a return to a previous state.