Brian Teitell
Active Member
ok, so i am leaving for college soon and my parents are giving me there computer.....but there is one problem it goes really slow. I want to wipe it clean, can u like just go to a setting to reformat to how you bought it?
Computer question
- Thread starter Brian Teitell
- Start date
Help Support Ford SportTrac Forum:
J Ellsworth
Member
Bring it to the GEEK SQUAD at Best Buy and they will make it all better...
JE
P.S. I work for Best Buy... I think I get paid to say that...
JE
P.S. I work for Best Buy... I think I get paid to say that...
Tony Favaloro
Member
simply, NO. Unless you have system recovery disks or the ability to burn some you would have to buy the OS you want on it.
Dale Carlson
Active Member
Probably not. Some companies (like HP) used to have a utility partition (a portion of the hard drive that you wouldn't normally see) that would let you reinstall the operating system with the click of the mouse.
If you can find the computer's recovery & operating system CDs, you might be able to do it yourself. If you're going to wipe the drive anyway, you can't really hurt anything.
Obviously, you can take it to someone else. My father-in-law just had some problems that I couldn't help him with over the phone, so he took it to, well, I do think it was Best Buy, and they fixed it for about $65.
If you can find the computer's recovery & operating system CDs, you might be able to do it yourself. If you're going to wipe the drive anyway, you can't really hurt anything.
Obviously, you can take it to someone else. My father-in-law just had some problems that I couldn't help him with over the phone, so he took it to, well, I do think it was Best Buy, and they fixed it for about $65.
shawn stonbraker 2
Well-Known Member
I have only had HP products and yes they have the ability to get it right back to "out of the box" condition. I've only had to do it once on my old computer and it wasn't bad, but wasn't fun either. Had to set everything back up completely. If it's an HP see if it has "HP System restore" under "PC Help and Tools".
Deleted deleted
Well-Known Member
We'd need more info to help you. What are the specs on the PC? How much RAM? Processor speed? Heck, if it's a 1.5ghz P4 with 256mb of ram, it's gonna be slow no matter if it's freshly reimaged or not.
My daughter is still using a 5 year old H/P Pavilion that has a 1ghz P3, 512mb of ram. It will boot and run XP, but is not capable of doing anything beyond basic web browsing and using MS Office. No way it could play any of today's PC games.
My daughter is still using a 5 year old H/P Pavilion that has a 1ghz P3, 512mb of ram. It will boot and run XP, but is not capable of doing anything beyond basic web browsing and using MS Office. No way it could play any of today's PC games.
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Thomas Rogers
Well-Known Member
Another possibility is Ubuntu (a free Linux based OS) and OpenOffice (free MS office clone)..., especially if an older computer that is a little sluggish because as Darin points out it might be a little hardware constrained.
I would go to Ubuntu.com. You can even download a CD image that is bootable to try it on your computer without reinstalling to see if it is "for you".
I have linked Ubuntu.com. OpenOffice is at www.openoffice.org if memory serves.
TJR
I would go to Ubuntu.com. You can even download a CD image that is bootable to try it on your computer without reinstalling to see if it is "for you".
I have linked Ubuntu.com. OpenOffice is at www.openoffice.org if memory serves.
TJR
Chris Wofford
Member
I bet your parents kept the system recovery disks or on some of the newer systems there is another way to make it work. I did it on my brother-in-law's computer and there were no recovery disks. In that case, you can go back to just the way the computer was out of the box. Be sure to back up any documents that you want to keep. You lose everything with the exception of the programs on the computer from the manufacturer. Not hard to do. There will be directions in the paperwork that came with the computer.
This is something that you can definitely do yourself. I've done it on three different computers. I am not a computer guy. Heck, I would do tackle that job before I would attempt to change the shocks on the trac.
This is something that you can definitely do yourself. I've done it on three different computers. I am not a computer guy. Heck, I would do tackle that job before I would attempt to change the shocks on the trac.
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Dre L
Well-Known Member
If you have the system recovery disks as stated above, then yes, great. If not, you may be able to order them from the pc manufacturer.
You could also try this automated system tune-up by Microsoft (linked below). It works very well, but you need Windows 2000 or XP.
You could also try this automated system tune-up by Microsoft (linked below). It works very well, but you need Windows 2000 or XP.
Brian Teitell
Active Member
the computer is a 3 year old sony vaio and it has windows xp, 2.02 ghz and 480mb 60 gigs
Deleted deleted
Well-Known Member
Other than you erroneous RAM number ( no PC has 480mb of ram - it's either 256, 512, 768, 1024, etc), it should run quite well with a fresh image of Win XP.
shawn stonbraker 2
Well-Known Member
Darin, he may be going from the system page to get his RAM. It's probably a 512MB but with windows, etc it has 480. My old computer had one 128MB and a 256MB card and on the system page it said somthing like 420MB.
Brian, what I would do is see about putting another 512MB RAM card in on top of the one in there and dump everything you don't need. (program wise) What you have in there is more than apt to run Windows XP, but the extra RAM helps speed it up. Just a thought.
Brian, what I would do is see about putting another 512MB RAM card in on top of the one in there and dump everything you don't need. (program wise) What you have in there is more than apt to run Windows XP, but the extra RAM helps speed it up. Just a thought.
Nelson Atwell
Well-Known Member
Uninstall any software you don't need and delete any data files your parents had on there to free up additional space and then defragment the hard drive. Then visit PCPitstop.com. This site will run a free diagnostic of your system and offer help to correct any issues found.
Richard Kolb
Well-Known Member
You should have the system restore disks, those will allow you to go back to new condition. That is your best bet, but you will lose everything on it.
Beware of people who don't know a lot about computers but say that they do, they'll end up screwing you up in the end.
If the computer claims to have 480 megs of ram then you probably have 512 and you have 32 of it going toward your video card, since many new computers don't have their own video memory, they simply share system memory. Laptops tend to do this more then desktops but some desktops, especially lower end ones, do the same thing.
If you plan on doing this make sure that you have installation disk for everything you want first, the operating system, office or work processing suite, and virus protection. It's also a good idea to download the drivers for all your hardware and burn them to a cd, then you'll have them in case something doesn't install correctly.
I think my laptop came with instructions on how to restore it if I wanted to.
The thing that gets most people is that they'll forget to save their network settings. That's the #1 issue that I've seen. People will have everything but forget to write down their network settings and then they can never get the thing back on the internet. The #2 is that people forget that they have installed software or hardware and then the system restore either doesn't bring back all the software they expected or it won't work properly because they have additional hardware.
Beware of people who don't know a lot about computers but say that they do, they'll end up screwing you up in the end.
If the computer claims to have 480 megs of ram then you probably have 512 and you have 32 of it going toward your video card, since many new computers don't have their own video memory, they simply share system memory. Laptops tend to do this more then desktops but some desktops, especially lower end ones, do the same thing.
If you plan on doing this make sure that you have installation disk for everything you want first, the operating system, office or work processing suite, and virus protection. It's also a good idea to download the drivers for all your hardware and burn them to a cd, then you'll have them in case something doesn't install correctly.
I think my laptop came with instructions on how to restore it if I wanted to.
The thing that gets most people is that they'll forget to save their network settings. That's the #1 issue that I've seen. People will have everything but forget to write down their network settings and then they can never get the thing back on the internet. The #2 is that people forget that they have installed software or hardware and then the system restore either doesn't bring back all the software they expected or it won't work properly because they have additional hardware.
shawn stonbraker 2
Well-Known Member
That's some good info there Rich.
Fer Echegaray
Well-Known Member
If you DON"T have the recovery discs, go to the Sony Store, you can get them from them directly.
We got a new set for my wife's vaio laptop after I lost the original ones... I think they were like $20 for 2 DVDs
We got a new set for my wife's vaio laptop after I lost the original ones... I think they were like $20 for 2 DVDs
