Hi i purchased a hi grade laptop with windows xp when i recieved my laptop i did not recieve a disc to restore factory settings as i really need to do this what can i do is it possible to restore it with out the disc i just want to wipe everything off or do i need the disc please help.

Adele, July 2007

It may be that you can't restore your machine to the factory state without the disk. Normally machines like this come with a utility installed which then requires the disk to restore your system drive to the factory state.

For the future, consider buying imaging software like Norton Ghost. These applications create a complete snapshot of your drive (not a file based backup.) They snapshot the drive exactly as it is without "understanding" what is on the drive. You can use the image file they create to restore the drive (or a replacement drive) to the state it was when the snapshot was taken. Very very very handy!!!!!

Matthew, August 2007