Replacing Hard Drive - Factory Image Recovery

I have a Gateway computer that came preloaded with Windows 7.

I am replacing the internal hard drive and I am attempting to install the factory system recovery image from the system recovery disc that I made when I bought the computer. After installing the drive and booting up from the recovery disc, I go into full factory recovery but when I go in to the option to "restore to factory default" the option is grayed out. Do I need to format the drive first? How do I do this outside of windows?

Thanks for your help!

UPDATE - I booted up using my defective drive (which only barely works) I was able to format my new drive and add a new partition. Then I disconnected the defective drive, booted up from disk with the new drive still installed. Still didn't work.

if the old drive is still working why not clone it to the new drive?

There have been some software listed in messages here that can do that.

I have used this one and it works. Free version not the paid version.
http://www.todo-backup.com/products/home/free-backup-software.htm

"Disk Clone Tool

Clone or transfer all the data on a hard disk to another. Clone disk is especially useful to upgrade your hard drive to a new one without reinstalling operating systems and applications."

The feature I want to try next is
"Restore System to Dissimilar Hardware

The feature of "recover to dissimilar hardware" can simplify system migration with restoring system to dissimilar hardware configuration for hardware replacement under WinPE recovery environment."

Also has a feature that you check to align for SSD drive cloning.

Good Luck

if the old drive is still working why not clone it to the new drive?

There have been some software listed in messages here that can do that.

I have used this one and it works. Free version not the paid version.
http://www.todo-backup.com/products/home/free-backup-software.htm

"Disk Clone Tool

Clone or transfer all the data on a hard disk to another. Clone disk is especially useful to upgrade your hard drive to a new one without reinstalling operating systems and applications."

The feature I want to try next is
"Restore System to Dissimilar Hardware

The feature of "recover to dissimilar hardware" can simplify system migration with restoring system to dissimilar hardware configuration for hardware replacement under WinPE recovery environment."

Also has a feature that you check to align for SSD drive cloning.

Good Luck

The old drive is barely working. For example, It is so slow it takes over an hour to boot up. it also took over a week to back up 10 gigs of files which would normally be pretty quick. I assume cloning the drive would take forever. So I would prefer to reinstall windows if it's possible. I don't understand why the recovery disk won't work since this is the whole point for making it.

Thanks!

Sorry, didn't mean to quote you above.

Do you have any idea or know what is the problem with the old "defective" hard drive? I ask this with a view to cloning it (in order to recover the factory re-install partition to the new hard drive).

Please bear with me for a little while ... I would like you to put the old "defective" hard drive back in the computer (remove the new hard drive) and boot from the recovery disk that you made. Do you now see the option available to "restore to factory default". I don't want you to use it ... I just want to know if it is now available for you to use, as distinct from what you see when doing the same thing with the new hard drive in place.

I just booted up from the disc with only the old drive connected. It DOESallow you to attempt a factory default restore on the old drive. Is this because there is a recovery partition?

Btw, I already did the factory restore once on the old drive and it didn't improve any of the symptoms. When I formatted the new drive I created only one parittion using these instructions from WD:

http://wdc.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/search/1/a_id/3865/c/130/p/227,295

I just booted up from the disc with only the old drive connected. It DOES allow you to attempt a factory default restore on the old drive. Is this because there is a recovery partition?

Yes, I think that is the case. I suspect that the "recovery disk" that you made originally, will only enable you to boot from it to access an existing "factory restore" recovery partition on the hard drive. Hence, no joy trying to use it with the new hard drive!

Do not concern yourself with partitioning/formatting the new hard drive. That is not of any relevance at this time.

Have you in any way tested the old "defective" hard drive to find out whether or not there is actually anything wrong with it, and if so what exactly is wrong with it? Please tell us what brand/model this old hard drive is.

At this stage I can see just two options for you:

• Order recovery/re-installation disks from Gateway for your particular system. (This is a commonly used solution)
• Clone the old hard drive to the new hard drive and then, on the new hard drive, use the "factory restore" partition to re-install the operating system. (I have done this a number of times.)

I tend to see option #1 as being the easiest choice for you.

I havent actually tested the drive since it takes so long to do anything once you get it booted up. So I am installing the new one to see if this fixes the issue. I spoke to an IT who thought it might be the hard drive. WD gave sent me a program that can help diagnose a bad drive which I may try to run. Here are the major symptoms:

-Computer is EXTREMELY SLOW to boot up or do anything, this happended all of a sudden a couple weeks ago. It was running very fast before.
-Before I did the first factory reinstall, I was getting errors that "you may be the victim of software counterfeiting" and text at the bottom of my wallpaper saying "Windows version is not valid" even though I kept verifying my version of windows.
-Occassionally when I boot up, it goes into a black screen that says " one of your discs needs to be checked for consistency". THis scans all the files for about an hour and then eventually boots up without fixing any symptoms.

Does any of this point to a bad hard drive?

Old Drive - WD Caviar Green Model #WD10EADS
New Hard Drive - WD Caviar Blue Model # WD10EALX


At this point I F***ING hate Gateway due to the horrible customer service that I have received on this issue. I would prefer to try to clone the drive than to deal with any of Gateway's people or give them another penny for recovery discs! lol

Can you instruct me on the best way to clone the drive?

Thanks!

I havent actually tested the drive since it takes so long to do anything once you get it booted up.

It is best to test the hard drive outside of Windows: It doesn't matter whether Windows actually works or not, or even if it is installed or not.

I'll post the instructions: I take it that you have a working computer available to download a file or two, and to burn a CD.

Check your system HDD with the HDD manufacturer's diagnostic utility ...

Go to the WD Caviar Green Downloads page and download Data Lifeguard Diagnostic for DOS

• Unzip (right-click > Extract all) the file when you have downloaded it, to get to the .ISO image file.
  (Read the instructions while you are there.)

If you do not already have a suitable burning program for writing .ISO images to disc ...

• Download and install ImgBurn.
  Ensure that you UN-check the box agreeing to install the Ask toolbar during the installation.
• Place a new (blank) CD disc in the drive tray.
• Choose Write image file to disc.
  
  • Under Source, click on the Browse button: Navigate to and select the .ISO file that you wish to burn.
  • Place a check-mark in the box beside Verify.
• Click
  
  When the CD has been burned and verified as successful, it will be bootable.

Boot from the CD.

• (You may need to change the boot order to enable booting from CD before hard drive.)
• Run the Short/Quick test and then the Long/Extended test].
  There is a chance that during the Long test, you may be offered the opportunity to attempt repairs on the hard drive: If so, decline the offer at this stage, and exit/shut-down the computer.
• Please let us know the results of the tests.

======================
You wrote: "WD gave sent me a program that can help diagnose a bad drive which I may try to run."
What exactly have you got? Is it a bootable CD with the diagnostic utility on it? In that case, no need to go through all of the above rigmarole. Simply boot with it and run the tests.

I download the .iso image directly from this page http://support.wdc.com/product/download.asp?groupid=608&sid=30&lang=en

Burned it to CD and booted up from CD, it went balck for awhile then comes up with a screen that says

"DIAG504f - Data Lifegaurd Diagnostics
No drive found
Error/Status code: 0120
WD Copyright...
Press any key to continue"

Did I do something wrong or those this indicate a bad drive?

Check to make sure you have the old hard drive connected properly ... both power and data cables. If the old hard drive will still boot into Windows (however slowly), the WD diagnostic utility should be able to detect it!!!

Test with the new hard drive connected, instead. The same utility is used for all WD hard drives, so don't worry about it being for one or the other model of WD hard drive. It won't hurt to run it on the new hard drive: In fact, I like to run the tests on all my new hard drives before I actually use them!

Sorry, must be away for a few hours. Good luck.

The drive cables are properly secured. It doesnt recognize either the old or new drives. I burned the CD a 2nd time with the same results for both drives. Not sure what is going on here. The advance boot screen recognizes the drives. I have never had an issue with the DVD drive either.

Can we just attempt to clone the drive at this point since this isnt working?

Since running the tests through DOS didnt work, I ran the Data Lifegaurd Diagnostics from within windows which is what WD tech support previously told me to do. The old drive failed the quick test and the new drive passed the quick test successfully. There is a note at this page that if the quick test fails that the drive needs to be replaced.

http://wdc.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/940


I am running the extended tests now, but these will take a bit.