Where's my Windows 8?

[Unpredict2ble]

My hard drive failed on my system. I was running the Widnwos 10 update, although my system came with Windows 8. After replacing my hard drive, Windows 7 is currently being installed to my system. 

What happened to my Windows 8, and what happened to sending OS disc with computers these days? Downloading software and drivers from the cloud or none of that does you any good when you can't even get your computer to start. Give me back the disc, at least then I can get my PC up and running.

[WAWood]

@Unpredict2ble

Hello;

Allow me to welcome you to the HP forums!

Sorry, have no idea how Win7 got onto your PC, if it came originally with Win 8.

As to including CDs, that practice stopped years ago, when OEMs decidec to include Recovery partititons on the PC so the customer could make their OWN disks.  If you never created those disks, that is hardly the fault of HP.

According to the HP Product Page for your PC, it came preinstalled with Win8.1 -- and you can order HP Recovery Media from this link:  https://support.hp.com/us-en/drivers/selfservice/hp-envy-700-200-desktop-pc-series/5399651/model/652...

You'll see the HP Recovery Media link down near the bottom of the page.

Good Luck

[erico]

I wish I had better news for you.

When you initially setup your PC, there was an onscreen message which asked if you were ready to create recovery media. You had the choice of creating the media then or clicking on Continue, which ignored the media creation request and let you continue setting up your PC.

Until ythe time that you allowed the Windows 10 update to occur, there was a utility installed called HP recovery media creator that would allow you to create recovery media.It may still be there.

Check with the File Explorer to see if the 😧 Recovery partition still exists.

You can also type in the word recovery in the search box to see if HP Recovery MediatorCreator appears above. If HP Recovery Media creator still appears, then you can stil create recovery media.

If you deleted the D:Recovery partition, then you removed the ability to create Recovery media at no cost to yourself.

The Recovery media was to be your plan "B" or copy of the operating systemthat you paid for.

You can purchase recovery media. Since you  made, perhaps inadvertently, an unwise choice, the recovery media will not be free.

In the US

http://www.computersurgeons.com/m-185-hp-notebook.aspx

or

https://restoredisks.com/

In Europe and most of the rest of the world.

Best2serve.com

[Unpredict2ble]

When I purchased the PC from BestBuy it already had everything installed. I don't even have a Win 8 sticker on the tower with the serial number. 

I can't get it to start, therefore I can't make any media backup. Should I have created it when I got the PC? Thats the last thing a person thinks about unless you're a techy.

[WAWood]

@Unpredict2ble

Win8 PCs do not come with product key stickers -- that was phased out.  The product key is embedded into the UEFI firmware of the motherboard, and you can retrieve it with this utility:  https://github.com/Superfly-Inc/ShowKeyPlus/releases/download/ShowKeyPlus6125/ShowKeyPlus.zip


Good Luck

[Unpredict2ble]

Thank you very much! Giving that a shot.

[mdklassen]

> I was running the Windows 10 update, although my system came with Windows 8.

If your computer was running Windows 10, you were granted a "digital entitlement" to reinstall Windows 10 for free, on the same computer.

For free, download Windows 10: https://www.microsoft.com/en-ca/software-download/windows10

It will help you write to an 8GB USB memory-stick, or to burn a few DVD-recordable disks.

Boot from this media, to launch the Windows 10 Installer.

When prompted to enter the 25-character product key, click "I do not have one".

When you connect to the Internet, your entitlement will be confirmed, and Windows will activate itself.

[Unpredict2ble]

Thanks for your reply.