[trevor1973]

I have a Fujitsu Siemens PC which came with Vista Basic. The sticker on the front had Basic yet I have a premium key on the back. Anyway, Microsoft said I should have had premium, Fulitsu argued otherwise. I managed to acquire an upgrade disc from a friend and installed Vista Premium. I don't have access to that disc anymore but I of course know the key as its in system and its activated, and have a key on the back of my laptop.

For the last few weeks I have had problems with the PC hanging on bootup, happens regularly - often have to reboot twice or 3 times. After running a system check with a Fujitsu programme it found I had no hardware problems so they said it was a software issue and I needed to run the Fujitsu Recovery Disc and restore to factory settings. I have backed up all my data using backup/restore but I was wondering if when I restore the files will it rstore my Vista Premium? The factory settings will have of course set it back to Basic.

Finally, this hanging is something I could put up with if it meant not losing Premium. Its never after one, two or 3 times failed to load. Or should I just restore and get back basic and then wait for Windows 7

Thanks for your help, this is my first post

Trevor

[Alvin.C]

Hello,

Originally Posted by trevor1973

...I have backed up all my data using backup/restore but I was wondering if when I restore the files will it rstore my Vista Premium?...

It depends on what type of backup you performed using Vista Backup and Restore Center.

There are two types of backup you can do in the Backup and Restore Center. The first is a file backup, and the second is a backup image of the entire contents on the hard drive allowing you to restore both files and the operating system (to the state when backup was performed).

If you have only backed up your files (using the first method) then only your files will be restored when you restore them in the Backup and Recovery center (after re-installing Vista Basic).

With regards to the problem of Vista Premium hanging when booting up, if the Vista upgrade disc doesn't come with SP1, have you installed Vista Service Pack 1 to see if it fixes the problem?

You could also try doing a fresh/clean install of Vista Premium instead of an upgrade (then restore your files afterward using the Backup and Restore Center) to see if the problem persists. It is possible to do a fresh install of Vista using a Vista upgrade disc. Just follow the instructions in the following article:

Perform a Clean Install with a Vista Upgrade Disc | Vista Rewired

[trevor1973]

Thanks for those tips. I have SP 1 installed

I had wanted to get a programme which would create an entire image of the contents of the hard drive for a while now. What would people reccomend I buy for doing that - I see there are some free utilities for doing that but I guess they wouldn't be as good as something I have heard of like a programme called Ghost. Can you put the image back onto your original drive. I was reading some of those free utilities and you couldnt do that

Do you think that hanging will just stay the way it is or could it eventually stop loading up entirely?

Any of these able to do that

Free Hard Disk Backup and Restore, Hard Disk Image and Cloning Utilities (thefreecountry.com)

So if i did a factory reset and then put the image of the entire hard drive back on - the problems of hanging wouldnt arise again would they?

Thanks again for the advice, much appreciated

Trevor

[Alvin.C]

Hello,

Who knows. Shall have to see as you power on and off.

You can perform an entire image backup of your hard drive in the Vista Backup and Restore center.

[trevor1973]

I only have the backup files or restore files option
I thought only Vista Ultimate and Business had the image backup option

From Microsoft

Available in Windows Vista Business, Ultimate, and Enterprise editions, Windows Complete PC Backup and Restore is a comprehensive, image-based backup tool that will help you out of a tight spot if you need to recover your entire system.

Thats not in Basic or Premium as far as I know. I dont have the option

Trevor

[Alvin.C]

Originally Posted by trevor1973

I only have the backup files or restore files option
I thought only Vista Ultimate and Business had the image backup option

From Mictosoft

Available in Windows Vista Business, Ultimate, and Enterprise editions, Windows Complete PC Backup and Restore is a comprehensive, image-based backup tool that will help you out of a tight spot if you need to recover your entire system.

Thats not in Basic or Premium as far as I know. I dont have the option

Trevor

Sorry my bad, or Microsoft's bad for their crazy number of editions with different feature sets :tounge:.

SystemRescueCd (which is also listed at thefreecountry.com) is a free, bootable version of Linux containing a vast range of system tools for repairing a system and managing/recovering data. It has on it Partimage, which is a tool for saving partitions on a hard drive to an image file, which you can then restore using tools on the SystemRescueCD. The advantage of using the SystemRescueCD is that you can boot into it without the need of having an operating system installed on the system, therefore it's good for when the operating system is unbootable.

There are many others though, which are probably easier to use. For example, Macrium Reflect Free Edition also allows you to backup your entire hard drive to an image file, and restore it within Windows, and outside Windows using a Linux boot CD or BartPE.