Re: Lost Vista Recovery Disk
Hey try to get touch with your manufacturer's for the new vista disc. See to it, if they can send you a new disc. Other wise go to the Microsoft website and download a WEB version of Vista. This will guide you through the process, Microsoft knows this will happen so they set up a site specifically for this kind of issues.
However, you "CANNOT use another copy of Vista" because of the keys that they have. Microsoft will lock the OS up, and this is specifically for vista rather than XP. Either call the manufacturer or call Microsoft.
Re: Lost Vista Recovery Disk
If you know someone else who has an Anytime Upgrade disc, a retail Vista disc, or an OEM disc, you can use any one of those as well to install install Windows Vista, as well as try to keep a copy in the same drive on your pc.
1. Get a partition program (Acronis Disk Director, PartitionMagic, FDISK, etc.)
2. Create a new partition (about 3.5GB), call it "Vista_Install" or something
3. Get DeamonTools
4. Mount the Vista Install .iso using deamon
5. Explore the mounted cd
6. Copy all the files on the mounted cd
7. Paste these files into your "Vista_Install" partition
8. In My Computer, the icon for your "Vista_Install" partition should change to an install cd icon; the name of the partition should change, too (to the name of the install CD)
9. Double-click your "Vista_Install" partition
10. In the auto-run, click Install... If it doesn't auto-run the setup - explore the "Vista Install" partition and open setup.exe
These will help you in future, if in any case you don't have the disc with you.:thumbup1:
Re: Lost Vista Recovery Disk
Many times the manufacture might have copied the contents of the Anytime Upgrade DVD directly onto the hard disk of the computer. You can sometimes find it,in a hidden folder called "WAU" The problem is that you cannot directly burn this to a DVD and then boot from it to do a clean install, for that you first need to burn the files as a bootable DVD in order to use them. Follow the below steps to create a bootable DVD from these files:
1. Download, install, and run vLite
2. Select the location with the WAU folder
3. Select your vista version
4. Select the ISO button and make the ISO. You can create an image or directly burn to DVD.
Now you should have a bootable Anytime Upgrade DVD you can use for a clean install.
Here are some places you might find the folder on your system:
* C:\Windows\sonysys\wau (hidden folder)
You may also find it on your system by doing the following:
* Click Start--> Windows Anytime Upgrade--> Choose your edition
Under the upgrade option a message will display whether your pc is pre-configured for Anytime Upgrade
Hope so it may help you out.:thumbup1: