Computer donated to me. What should I check for?

C

Chiller449

Member
Darren said:
Take the disc out.
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ok i took the disk out and shut the pc down. i restarted and it booted like it normally would. i got past the floppy disk error message and it told me to put a disk in. im going to take a pic of the boot sequence and upload it so you guys can tell me if its right.
 
johnb35

johnb35

Administrator
Staff member
Once you move the HDD to the first slot, windows should load. As I said, disable the floppy drive thats why your getting the error for it. Its enabled and its not finding a floppy drive.

Go to the drives section arrow over to diskette drive and hit enter, should be able to disable it from there.
 
C

Chiller449

Member
johnb35 said:
Once you move the HDD to the first slot, windows should load. As I said, disable the floppy drive thats why your getting the error for it. Its enabled and its not finding a floppy drive.

Go to the drives section arrow over to diskette drive and hit enter, should be able to disable it from there.
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Ok ill do it when i get home. If it does not load then what? I could be wrong like i said i dont know anything about computers but i think the operating system was deleted when i did the long system restore. If so would i just have to buy windows 7 and re-install?
 
C

Chiller449

Member
johnb35 said:
Ok this thread is getting weird. I thought you were using that windows 10 cd to reinstall windows???
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No. My It guy gave it to me because he thought i could install it on the computer. Apparently he is not much of an IT guy. I dont think i can use this disk to install windows 10 on my pc. The pc had windows 7 on it. but i think it may have been deleted when i restored the computer.
 
johnb35

johnb35

Administrator
Staff member
Use the cd to install 10, shouldn't have a problem with it. Usually with Dell systems as long as the installer detects a dell motherboard, it will install and activate without issue.
 
C

Chiller449

Member
johnb35 said:
Use the cd to install 10, shouldn't have a problem with it. Usually with Dell systems as long as the installer detects a dell motherboard, it will install and activate without issue.
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will it ask me to install? or will it do it automatically? seems like everytime i put the disk in it just asks me if i want to reset everything. maybe windows 10 has already installed and i didnt realise because i have never gotten windows to open because i have the boot sequence messed up? But on the disk packaging is a product key. shouldnt i have had to put that key in?
 
johnb35

johnb35

Administrator
Staff member
You need to boot to the dvd and it should run you through an install process. It may or may not ask you to input the key. It shouldn't be asking you to reset windows unless you aren't booting to the cd. Did you go into the bios and change your boot order so that cdrom drive is first?
 
johnb35

johnb35

Administrator
Staff member
I would have to see a video of what you are seeing to tell you what to do. Doesn't really sound like you are booting to the install dvd. You could always use the windows 10 media creation tool to create a windows 10 install disk.
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=691209

Download the tool, run it. Select to create bootable cd by downloading the iso file. Then use windows disc image burner to burn the image to a dvd.
 
C

Chiller449

Member
What is the purpose of the disk i have? can it install windows 10 on a computer that had windows 7 on it? i would much rather have windows 7 as the computer is older and would probably work better. But if i already have the disk i might as well download 10. i will remove the disk when i get home and change my bios to the correct sequence. if that does not work i will change the bios to where the dvd player runs first. also when i start the comnputer up and hit f12 which function should i select? start normally?
 
Darren

Darren

Moderator
Staff member
beers said:
create a bootable USB flash drive.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10/
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Do this. Full clean install of Windows 10. You can do a USB key or disc as John mentioned. I prefer USB drives because they're easy and don't have to fuss with a disc drive.

Wipe the ENTIRE drive as per this.

johnb35 said:
Look at the below image. Click on each line entry and click on delete below. How big is the hard drive? When you have 1 entry that says unallocated then you click on new and leave it as 1 partition or partition it however you like.

View attachment 7317
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Forget the disk you already have. I think you're just confusing yourself with it, especially since it's a recovery disk and apparently not a true installation disk (I think).

Once you've done this, remove the USB drive you used and
 
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