what if i don't have a windows 7 setup dvd?

marsmimar said:

Hello William and welcome to Seven Forums. If your computer shipped with an OEM disk you can use that instead of a retail disk. Make sure your BIOS is set to boot from the CD/DVD drive and you should get all the same options on the OEM disk as you would with a retail disk. If you have no disk at all, your computer manufacturer might have a hidden recovery partition that can restore your machine to factory settings.

Correct. What you'll find is there'll be an OEM installd Recovery application in the start menu.

Additional:
With some OEM Recovery Managers it's advisable to maually backup your user/personal files. Some do offer a Non Destructive factory restore which will automatically backup your files and reinstate them in your new factory restore.

Hello williamwclee, welcome to Seven Forums!


Have a look at this information below and be sure to post back with any further questions you may have and to keep us informed.


After you have copied out or made back-ups of the data you need to save to external media; if you can find an exact Windows version that the PC shipped with you can do a clean install using the activation key on the COA sticker attached to the PC though it may require a robo-call to MS to sort the OEM batch-key.

How to Activate Windows 7 by Phone


If you can't find an exact same version, you could use the info in this tutorial to create an "all versions" installer of any version Windows installer, to install using the same method I posted above.

Windows 7 Universal Installation Disc - Create


After you have made backups of everything you care to save, the best method is to do a complete wipe (secure erase) of the entire Hard Disk Drive first, it over-writes everything, all the old Windows code including all the old drivers/programs, giving you the best possible space to install Windows to.

SSD / HDD : Optimize for Windows Reinstallation

DISKPART : At PC Startup

Try booting the OEM Disk to see if it offers on Second screen to Install Now as well as the Repair My Computer console, as an HP OEM DVD should have these and be fully bootable.
How to Boot your Computer from a Bootable CD or DVD

You can also extract any favorite HP programs or utilities from the Recovery Disks to reinstall after clean install using this method: https://www.sevenforums.com/installat...tml#post488270

williamwclee said:

i am not sure whether there is a boot recovery offered by that OEM installation
but i don't think so.

i guess that OEM copy is a proprietory one specially written by HP.

any further suggestions?


William,
Hong Kong.
2011.3.10

Every HP I have used, had a program group entry for creating the System Restore Disks.

Another option for reinstalling at a later time would be via imaging. That is less painful than an installation from scratch. I recommend free Macrium or free Paragon.