Stutopia Posted March 27, 2013 Share Posted March 27, 2013 I'm swapping out the HDD on a mate's ACER Aspire V5 for an SSD this weekend. Done this before on my old Dell, simples. The only question I have is about creating a Windows 8 install ISO. I'd rather not clone the HDD straight onto the SSD, I prefer a clean Windows 8 install. However, in the olden days, this used to be easy as they threw in a CD/DVD copy of the OS when you spent £1000 on a new laptop. Clearly manufacturers can't afford to do that these days and you get a recovery partition instead. (Can anyone explain what use they are if your HDD catastrophically fails? sorry off topic already!) Anyone know if you can burn a Windows 8 CD/DVD from within dirty Windows 8 like you can on my beautiful OSX Moutain Lion iMac? Ta. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MartynB85 Posted March 27, 2013 Share Posted March 27, 2013 The recovery partition is useless if the HDD fails, you would have to start from scratch from disc or USB.... So does the laptop currently have windows 8 installed? If it does i would clone the HDD to the SSD and then do a fresh install from the recovery partition. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
4RE Leather Posted March 27, 2013 Share Posted March 27, 2013 can't you just make recovery discs? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stutopia Posted March 27, 2013 Author Share Posted March 27, 2013 It does have windows 8 installed. I got the product key from Belarc, went to Microsoft to download the image and burn ISO to DVD, however, I got a rude message saying, "your product key can't be used to install a retail version of windows 8", please **** off and buy a new one. Thanks Bill. Naturally I'm not impressed, my mate has bought legit windows 8 laptop and they give you no install disc and no recourse to download and make your own, plus an entirely useless recovery process. If I was a total novice, this would be an even bigger nightmare. As you said, it will probably have to be a clone job, then reinstall from partition. I don't like to clone partitioned drives in case of any misalignment. I'm sending him off to PC World tomorrow to try and blag a retail disc, unlikely as that may be, failing that call Microshaft and have a whinge on the phone and see what they'll do. If that doesn't work, I'll install Mountain Lion whilst he's not looking and run off. I can burn a install disk from that in about 15 minutes, with zero dicking about with product keys. I get that digital downloads are the future of all software but there's no need to not give out a £1 DVD with the OS on when you buy a laptop/pc, or allow you to make one. Clonezilla here I come. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KyleR Posted March 28, 2013 Share Posted March 28, 2013 Being a Mac man myself and not giving a @*!# about Microshaft, is it possible to just clone the partition to the SSD and leave the rest of the rubbish on the HDD and try booting from it using F8 or whatever it is? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stutopia Posted March 28, 2013 Author Share Posted March 28, 2013 Good shout Kyle, I'll start there I think. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DoogyRev Posted March 28, 2013 Share Posted March 28, 2013 You could go back to the manufacturer of the laptop, say the drive failed and they should supply you with a disc : shrug: Or do what Kyle said : thumbs: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stutopia Posted March 28, 2013 Author Share Posted March 28, 2013 It's been alleged by Acer tech support that you can burn a recovery DVD or pen drive from the "secret" partition, should be a nice solution and means my mate will have emergency bootable media lying around somewhere safe(ish) in case it all falls to pieces in future. Shame I had to go through extended discussions with their Support Drone 2.0 and being advised to go and buy a retail version as my only choice. I particularly enjoyed being told that it's impossible to get the windows 8 product key from the laptop. What, this one in front of me written down on an old envelope that I just gave you over the phone? I still don't know why they can't give you a 50p DVD copy. Thanks for the suggestions, got a few contingencies which is nice when monkeying about with laptops. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stutopia Posted April 3, 2013 Author Share Posted April 3, 2013 In closure, acer recovery partition failed to write a boot/recovery disc to pen drive after numerous formats, error checks. Off to buy a retail code for Windows 8 and sort it properly, then whinge about it to acer PC world and get some sort of cash back. All for the want of 50p proper boot cd thrown into the box! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
marzman Posted April 3, 2013 Share Posted April 3, 2013 i was under the impression that your windows product key should be on a sticker on the bottom of the laptop, and you'd just download an install from microsoft and use your code from the sticker? I'm guessing thats what you've already done... in which case im a bit worried as i bought an Acer laptop for the missus last month and i assumed i'd follow this process as and when i needed to... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stutopia Posted April 3, 2013 Author Share Posted April 3, 2013 The usual sticker is nowhere visible on my mate's, looked under battery, inside case, etc. It's probably in the info that came with his laptop, but his Mrs has tidied that up and "put it somewhere safe". However, you can easily pull the product key from some freeware like Belarc (get it from download.com), it shows up the key after a quick scan. However, once I got the key and tried to download the iso from Microdicks to burn a disk, it's then that it spat out the above error about not being a retail version (which Acer tech support confirmed on the phone). After the USB pen drive didn't work (it demands a minimimum 16GB by the way) I tried a USB hard drive, which it copied the recovery partition to in no time at all, but I'd be blowed if I could get it to boot from it and "restore" to the new SSD after countless attempts inside the BIOS to shuffle the boot order and switch off the ever irritating secure boot. Last resort will be a straightforward disk to disk clone, but I'm not convinced this will give him the best performance results (which is the whole point of a SSD!). I'm staying Mac for now, and telling everyone I meet to do the same! Good luck if you need to recover a fully broken HDD, the Acer tech support guy was actually quite friendly and helpful, once we got through the natural language barrier. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
marzman Posted April 3, 2013 Share Posted April 3, 2013 Cool, cheers. Good luck! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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