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lyndylu
one bitch wonder
Joined: 12 Jun 2008
Posts: 3
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 Posted: Thu Jun 12, 2008 10:05 am Post subject: How to get Dell to send a Windows XP Home installation disk? |
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My parents' Dell PC (Dimension 5000 running XP Home - out of warranty) won't boot and diagnostics show an 'Uncorrectable data error or media is write protected' error on one block.
A search of various forums suggests that, if I had the XP installation disk I could run a recovery program which would, hopefully, allow me to boot the PC, recover the data and copy it to a new hard drive.
However, the PC came pre-installed with XP, and no O/S disk was supplied. I read on this and other forums that Dell will provide installation disks if requested, so I called customer services and tech support who, after some argument, eventually agreed to send me an XP disk. It never showed up.
Has anyone else managed to get Dell to send them installation disks, and if so how did you go about it. I don't mind paying to cover Dell's admin costs .
I found an online form for requesting installation disks but this appears to be for US customers only. I am based in th UK.
Thanks
LyndyLu |
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Commendatore
Hates with a Vengance
Joined: 10 Jun 2008
Posts: 80
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| Posted: Thu Jun 12, 2008 10:28 am Post subject: Re: How to get Dell to send a Windows XP Home installation d |
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| lyndylu wrote: | My parents' Dell PC (Dimension 5000 running XP Home - out of warranty) won't boot and diagnostics show an 'Uncorrectable data error or media is write protected' error on one block.
A search of various forums suggests that, if I had the XP installation disk I could run a recovery program which would, hopefully, allow me to boot the PC, recover the data and copy it to a new hard drive.
However, the PC came pre-installed with XP, and no O/S disk was supplied. I read on this and other forums that Dell will provide installation disks if requested, so I called customer services and tech support who, after some argument, eventually agreed to send me an XP disk. It never showed up.
Has anyone else managed to get Dell to send them installation disks, and if so how did you go about it. I don't mind paying to cover Dell's admin costs .
I found an online form for requesting installation disks but this appears to be for US customers only. I am based in th UK.
Thanks
LyndyLu |
You can try calling Dell and cry to them you never got a reinstall disk for Windows and that you need it badly to recover important data because your hard drive is failing. It worked for me once.
If they don't accommodate you, get "Active Boot Disk"
| Quote: | | http://www.ntfs.com/boot-disk.htm |
This is a bootable CD/DVD/USB disk that allows you to boot up your computer to a WinPE 2.0 operation environment and allow you to make a disk image of the hard drive so you can restore it to another hard drive thereby recovering your data, among other things.
Even if you cannot boot into Windows, you will be able to boot into this.
I use this all the time to do image backups and restores of my hard drive and it has never once failed me. |
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lyndylu
one bitch wonder
Joined: 12 Jun 2008
Posts: 3
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| Posted: Fri Jun 13, 2008 5:21 am Post subject: |
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| Thanks for the reply Commendatore, I'll give the boot disk a try. |
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lyndylu
one bitch wonder
Joined: 12 Jun 2008
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| Posted: Mon Jun 16, 2008 3:07 am Post subject: |
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Worked like a dream.
Thanks |
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kimberlemae
Regular Hater
Joined: 28 Jun 2008
Posts: 28
Location: DFW MetroPlex
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| Posted: Mon Jul 07, 2008 10:50 pm Post subject: Re: How to get Dell to send a Windows XP Home installation d |
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| Quote: | | http://www.ntfs.com/boot-disk.htm |
Would this work to get the data off a dead harddrive? |
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100pcob
Regular Hater
Joined: 29 Dec 2007
Posts: 20
Location: fuhgedabaddit!
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| Posted: Tue Jul 08, 2008 12:25 am Post subject: |
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I rarely say calling the script-monkeys will work, but in this case I've had good success, even with Dell's that are out of warranty. Call 1800-624-9896 go to support and give them your service tag. Tell them it's out of warranty and you'd appreciate a new set of XP Home reinstallation CD's. They will (would...as of last year) usually DHL them within one or two days.
As far as the drivers, just go to support.dell.com and get them and burn them to CD.
Dan |
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Rocke_T_Sinetist
Moderator
Joined: 26 Aug 2005
Posts: 2609
Location: DFW airport
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| Posted: Tue Jul 08, 2008 11:04 am Post subject: |
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NTFS disc will only work on an operating drive, and only recover undamaged sectors--those which can be read on multiple attempts and with full error correction.
Whether by design or by accident, when Windows first refuses to boot because of file damage, most of the files on the drive can still be readable. But Windows reacts to errors in its boot files by refusing to start, even though the errors may be correctable at that point, so you have a chance to recover data before the drive goes kablooey altogether.
Once the drive DOES go kablooey, recovery escalates slightly, from free, to in the neighborhood of $1000, with no guarantee as to what is recoverable.
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Rocke T Sinetist
as in, 'it doesn't take a...' |
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Commendatore
Hates with a Vengance
Joined: 10 Jun 2008
Posts: 80
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| Posted: Wed Jul 09, 2008 2:11 am Post subject: |
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| lyndylu wrote: | Worked like a dream.
Thanks |
You're welcome! I'm glad I was able to help. |
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Commendatore
Hates with a Vengance
Joined: 10 Jun 2008
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| Posted: Wed Jul 09, 2008 2:24 am Post subject: Re: How to get Dell to send a Windows XP Home installation d |
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| kimberlemae wrote: | | Quote: | | http://www.ntfs.com/boot-disk.htm |
Would this work to get the data off a dead harddrive? |
It includes a feature called Active@ Partition Recovery
| Quote: | | Recover lost partitions. This means that you can recover deleted or damaged partitions located on data volumes (D:, E:, and so on), attached hard drives, as well as on the external USB drives and Memory Cards (SunDisk, MemoryStick, CompactFlash, etc.). On a system partition, BOOT.INI is corrected automatically (if needed) to repair an un-bootable system. As well, damaged Volume Boot Sectors are corrected to maintain integrity of the partition. This utility also enables you to fix a damaged MBR and to delete invalid partitions. |
But I personally never tried it. You may want to give it a try. The disk image backup/restore feature alone is worth the price.
Another good rated utility that is said to retrieve data from damaged disks is GetDataBack
http://www.runtime.org/
| Quote: | GetDataBack will help you rescue your lost or inaccessible files from any imaginable data recovery disaster.
Data Recovery is possible more often than you might think - even without having to send your hard drive to a data recovery service. |
Again, I personally never tried it because I perform image backups religiously and have always relied on them for restoration in case of disasters. But many people have had great results with GetDataBack and it may be worth a try. |
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