Windows 8 Reinstall after drive failure

karnuffel

karnuffel

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Hi All,

I am trying to help a friend of mine that had a hard drive failure on her laptop (no recovery disks available). Someone else installed a new drive and plonked on a cracked version of windows 7. Unfortunately there are a massive amount of drivers missing and I cant find any drives for win 7 on the Acer support site.

How do I reinstall win 8.1 using the license on the lappy (on the BIOS if I understand correctly). Ive tried a couple of ISOs from the web but none of them detected the key and prompted me for a product key. I spoke to Acer support and they want to chage me R570 for install disks. The techie did say I can install win 8.1 ML? Any ideas?

Can I create install media from my lenovo (running 8.1 pro) and use that?
 
Just to add,

I tried using the media creation tool but Im not sure if I selected the correct options because I was still prompted for a product kry. I think ill try 8.1 pro based on my conversation with Acer.
 
Microsoft suggested I use someone elses install media... hmmmmmm
 
Sorry, I can be wrong, but if laptop is licenced for win8.1, then keys will be stored in the BIOS. Get utility to read SLIC version and key from the BIOS, you will know which copy of Windows you need to install from. If it is asking for a key, it means you installed a wrong copy.

In any case you must install copy of the Windows matching your certificate in BIOS. Don't worry much about drivers, you need only drivers for your Internet connection to activate Windows. Once activated, upgrade to the qualified version of Win 8.X (mean Windows 10). Let it run for a while to update drivers.
 
Can sometimes see version on product page on acer website. Did you try download win8.1 single language ?
I
 
sajunky said:
Sorry, I can be wrong, but if laptop is licenced for win8.1, then keys will be stored in the BIOS. Get utility to read SLIC version and key from the BIOS, you will know which copy of Windows you need to install from. If it is asking for a key, it means you installed a wrong copy.

In any case you must install copy of the Windows matching your certificate in BIOS. Don't worry much about drivers, you need only drivers for your Internet connection to activate Windows. Once activated, upgrade to the qualified version of Win 8.X (mean Windows 10). Let it run for a while to update drivers.
Click to expand...

Thanks I wil try this :) Googling SLIC as we speak

thehuman said:
Can sometimes see version on product page on acer website. Did you try download win8.1 single language ?
I
Click to expand...
I have not yet tried single language, the Acer website didnt help much.

eg2505 said:
easiest would be win 10 BTW;

give her a nice upgrade as most drivers will get picked up from 10,
Click to expand...
I need a legal copy of 8.1 first before I can do that unfortunately :(
 
Silly question, if someone installed a dodgey vesion of windows 7 on the laptop is it possible that during that process (activation, cracking etc) the licence on the BIOS could have been wiped/removed?
 
Just a note. I finally downloaded an image that works. I could not get the tool that reads the slic to work. I however did get a working image (windows only have so many of them) Turns out it wants an 8.1 pro dvd/usb. I anyone else ever sits in this position download "system builder ISOs".
 
jouda said:
Hi All,

I am trying to help a friend of mine that had a hard drive failure on her laptop (no recovery disks available). Someone else installed a new drive and plonked on a cracked version of windows 7. Unfortunately there are a massive amount of drivers missing and I cant find any drives for win 7 on the Acer support site.

How do I reinstall win 8.1 using the license on the lappy (on the BIOS if I understand correctly). Ive tried a couple of ISOs from the web but none of them detected the key and prompted me for a product key. I spoke to Acer support and they want to chage me R570 for install disks. The techie did say I can install win 8.1 ML? Any ideas?

Can I create install media from my lenovo (running 8.1 pro) and use that?
Click to expand...

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-ZA/windows-8/create-reset-refresh-media

The official M$ page on doing a fresh install. The installation should automatically pick up the key from the bios.
You can only do a clean windows 10 install after you've followed the upgrade process via Windows update.
 
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