Need Help in Formatting

[sevenshaven]

Hello im new here , and have a few questions , pls go through all of them . Thank You

First Question -
my lappy (laptop) came with win7 home basic installed , but due to virus i called the tech guy who completely wiped out all my partitions (even the recovery partition) and installed win7 ultimate.
Now i don't know how he activated the windows . I mean he was checking the sticker under my lappy for the serial key , but i have heard that the serial key for home basic won't apply on ultimate , then how he actually did it , is the big question? What are your thoughts ?

2nd question :
Does anyone has a download link of genuine win7 Home Basic ISO ? If yes pls post it here.

3rd Question:
Im again thinking of formatting my system, bcoz of another virus attack. and this time i'll do it myself so that i won't have to pay the tech guy.
But since i don't have a win7 home basic dvd , i guess i'll have to download a win7 ultimate iso from the net. and after that i think i'll use the recovery discs to install the original drivers .
Do u think thats the correct way ?? Do u think if i use the recovery discs on the already installed win7 ultimate , it will somehow install home basic over ultimate ?
Also is there a way to manually install only the drivers and not the bloatwares from the recovery discs?

Please provide detailed answers . Thanks

 

[theog]

   Information

We always assume you have made your Recovery Disks using the OEM manufacturer's Recovery Media Creator app the first day you had your new PC.
& made the Startup Repair CD.
startup repair disc-create
​

Did you make the OEM manufacturer's Recovery Disks?



You can order OEM Recovery disks from your OEM manufacturer's website.
Most OEM's will ship Recovery DVD's for FREE, (may be a postage fee)


You can Order HP Recovery Disks from here:
Country-Language Selector | HP® Support

 

[sevenshaven]

Yes the shop owner of the laptop store made recovery disks out of four blank dvds.
But that's not the thing . I already used my recovery discs once , in order to format my system , but later found out they don't format our system but restores our system to the original factory condition. and i also found out the recovery discs are pretty much useless , when it comes to format a PC due to virus issues, coz recovery discs don't delete viruses while restoring the system

Right now , i have a virus in my pc , which is sitting idle in my c drive > user > appdata > roaming folder ,
and its not doing much harm i guess (the name of the virus is skype.dat)
i have malwarebytes installed and also another antivirus called QuickHeal which is a purchased one.
Too bad quickheal didn't detected it but malwarebytes did , but malwarebytes failed to delete it.

Now i don't wanna download any more anti-viruses or similar apps . Only would like to perform a hard format by wiping out all partitions and do a clean install.
But the problem is , my laptop came with win7 Home Basic version (not Home premium) ... and i can't find a download link to Home Basic ISO anywhere .

So, i guess i don't have a choice but to install win7 ultimate.
But after formatting and installing win7 ultimate , if i use those recovery disks to install my original drivers , will it also install home basic over my already installed ultimate version??

 

[theog]

The HP Recovery DVD, will delete all DATA & reinstall Home Basic.

 

[sevenshaven]

As i said before , i used the recovery discs before (few months ago) , back then my pc was infected with different viruses (autorun and recycler viruses).
The recovery discs that i used back then , did erase all data , and restored it to factory condition , but it didn't delete the dangerous viruses , and later that evening while working on some word document , my pc hanged and stopped working , start menu wasn't functioning , keyboard wasn't responding and more such stuffs. So the next day, i had to call the tech guy to format my system.

I still don't get it , why they had to stop providing the OS dvd.
I mean , i can't even download the pirated ones avaialable on torrent sites , as some members there have commented that they have trojans in them.

Anyway does anybody have any solution to my problem?
Not trying to be rude or anything , but the answers by theog aren't helping me much.
i need some satisfying and detailed answers to all those 3 questions i asked on top of this thread. Thanx.

 

[DavidE]

I found these instructions by gregrocker on how to do a clean install of Home Basic.
Greg is the top SF installation guru.

If the licensed OS which came with the PC and is printed on the COA sticker on bottom with a readable Product Key is Home basic, then download Home Premium from Step 1 of Clean Reinstall - Factory OEM Windows 7, run the eicfg removal tool to unlock all versions, burn an all-versions installer to DVD or write to flash stick using the tool provided. Then choose your licensed version during Clean Install, do a Custom Install deleting all partitions using Drive Options in Step 7 of Clean Install Windows 7

Greg, what do think about adding a note in your Clean Reinstall tutorial for using the eicfg removal tool to get versions not directly available for download?

 

[whs]

Here you can learn how to install any Windows version (also Basic) from any Windows .iso:

How to Choose Desired Windows 7 Edition / Version During Setup? - Tweaking with Vishal

And here you have links for downloading a Windows .iso. Then follow the above tutorial:

[Direct Download Links] Download Genuine Windows 7 RTM with SP1 ISO (32-bit and 64-bit) - Tweaking with Vishal

 

[theog]

As i said before , i used the recovery discs before (few months ago) , back then my pc was infected with different viruses (autorun and recycler viruses).
The recovery discs that i used back then , did erase all data , and restored it to factory condition , but it didn't delete the dangerous viruses , and later that evening while working on some word document , my pc hanged and stopped working , start menu wasn't functioning , keyboard wasn't responding and more such stuffs. So the next day, i had to call the tech guy to format my system.

I still don't get it , why they had to stop providing the OS dvd.
I mean , i can't even download the pirated ones avaialable on torrent sites , as some members there have commented that they have trojans in them.

Anyway does anybody have any solution to my problem?
Not trying to be rude or anything , but the answers by theog aren't helping me much.
i need some satisfying and detailed answers to all those 3 questions i asked on top of this thread. Thanx.

Check the HP video:
Performing an HP System Recovery (Windows 7) | HP® Support

HP Recovery will delete all DATA.

 

[gregrocker]

Call the shop which reinstalled Win7 Ultimate when you own Basic and ask them how it is activated, and where is the paperwork with the MS COA sticker required to be provided whenever Win7 is installed on a PC like that. If they installed a bootleg copy of $200+ Ultimate then they committed a crime, especially if they charged you for it which is fraud. MS Customer Service may even reward you with a free copy if you choose to report it and cooperate with their investigation.

If not you've already been given the steps to get a perfect Clean Reinstall - Factory OEM Windows 7
including how to unlock all versions in any Win7 installer ISO to choose Basic during install. We will help you get a perfect install if the shop won't correct this for you.

I've added a note to the tutorial on how to unlock Basic version to the tutorial per David's excellent suggestion.

 

[sevenshaven]

Thanx Greg , David and Whs.
Currently downloading home premium 64 bit and then will do all of those stuffs that you mentioned in your post, like removing the ei.cfg file from iso and then making a bootable dvd out of it.
Seems quite easy from here on .
Will let you know how it goes and hope i'll succeed . hehe

... btw one more thing , after im done with the installation of win7 , i'll have to use my recovery dvds to install the original drivers right ? and at the same time it will also install all the bloatwares . lol .
Anyway , so what im trying to say is , few month ago i used the recovery dvds , and after the recovery process i found out that there were only 3 partitions .
Like C drive had the biggest space , D drive was the recovery partition and E drive contained some system files and it was almost full.
So, only C drive had most of the space available for my personal data storage like music , movies etc.
So, what should i do in such a situation ? Is there any way to avoid it , coz I don't want to be left with only 3 partitions after using the "factory restore" from recovery dvds.

 

[sevenshaven]

Hello again , I have successfully formatted and did a clean install of home basic .
Right now im using another computer to connect to internet , bcoz while formatting my system last night I deleted all drivers including the network driver . And now I need to install all the drivers from my recovery dvds .

Can I manually install only the drivers from my recovery dvds , instead of all those bloatwares in it and without the help of any third-party applications ??

and also please answer to my question above highlighted in green , like if I use those recovery dvds and use the factory restore option in order to install the drivers , then it will eventually make my hard disk partitions back to 3 partitions . I mean last night , while installing win7 from the bootable iso dvd, i made four partitions , and now I fear that the recovery dvds will turn them back to 3 Pls help me on this . thanks

 

[gregrocker]

If you're following the steps to get a perfect install in Clean Reinstall - Factory OEM Windows 7
it is quite specific about how drivers are handled in a driver-complete OS. Connect to the internet to do all rounds of Important and Optional Updates to completion, after enabling Automatically deliver drivers via Windows Update (Step 3) . Any drivers still missing after all Updates are done can be found on the Support Downloads webpage for your PC model.

If your PC is not ready to connect to the internet after install, you may need to download and install the wireless or ethernet driver from the same place. Or you can enable Automatically deliver drivers via Windows Update (Step 3) and then plug in the ethernet cable and its driver may load so you can connect from the bottom right System Tray.

If you have further questions about your partitioning, post back a screenshot of Disk Management - Post a Screen Capture Image - Windows 7 Help Forums.

And since you missed the clearly-written step about drivers, I suggest you go back to read Clean Reinstall - Factory OEM Windows 7 again to make sure you don't miss any other opportunity to get a perfect install.

 

[sevenshaven]

Hello Greg , there are some good news and bad news from my side , this is gong to be a long post , so pls go through all of it. Thank You.

Ok , Last night after formatting my lappy with the win7 ISO bootable dvd , i succesfully installed all the drivers from my recovery discs and my laptop went back to its factory condition. This is the good news.
Then i connected to the internet and went to the firefox site to download firefox browser and right then my PC was again attacked by some virus as my PC totally froze. So i went to the safe mode and did a virus scan , and my antivirus found that the firefox setup.exe was a virus . I have been using firefox since 2006 , so i was like , how can this be possible . . . Anyway , so i again did a format with my win7 iso bootable dvd and re-installed the drivers from my recovery discs today morning (totally tiring job) , and now im using IE . No more firefox for the time being .
What do u think , was it some other virus that disguised itself as firefox ?

Now another thing im gonna say , this isn't the first time i have used the recovery discs.
The first time i used the recovery discs was 4 or 5 months ago , and back then after using those recovery discs when i connected to the internet i was attacked by similar virus that froze my pc.
and last night also , after using the recovery discs and connecting to the internet just to download the firefox browser , my pc was attacked . The symptoms are similar , like task manager not working , start menu not working.
... Do you think there could be a virus in my recovery discs. I mean the shopowner made the recovery discs out of four blank dvds at the time of purchasing my laptop.

Both the times i used the recovery discs , i found two folders inside the $Recycle.Bin folder. They are empty though but kinda suspicious looking. Here is the screenshot -

[URL]http://i.imgur.com/hGBVnTu.png[/URL]

Do you think they are part of the system file.

... And i noticed that , if i only format and clean install via the win7 iso bootable dvd (and don't use the recovery discs) then there will be no such folders inside the $Recycle.bin folder.
Your thoughts on this one please . Thanks.

 

[DavidE]

Why didn't you get drivers from the HP support site as Greg suggested?
If you get drivers from the HP support site, you wouldn't need to use the Recovery discs for drivers.

Start here to get the drivers, you need to specify your Laptop model...
HP Support, Drivers, Contact and Help Forums | HP ® Support

 

[gregrocker]

So you just ignored the steps to get a perfect reinstall in Clean Reinstall - Factory OEM Windows 7, and then ignored where I typed out again how to handle drivers in Win7?

I suggest you do it over and this time correctly. I'm not going to type it out for a third time for you.

If you have a router make sure the Firewall is turned on. I would also install the AV at first while Updates are running.

Since you feel you have some type of persistent infection, I would wipe the HD before install with Diskpart Clean Command from the Command Line in the booted installer's System Recovery Options. Nothing will survive then.

Do not use driver disks. Do not use Recovery disks which reinstall the bloated factory preinstall and may be infected.