Creating Recovery Media Windows 10

[GTifeld]

This laptop came with Windows 8, but was since upgraded to 10 back when MS was offering it as a free download. A recovery set of media was never created for it and I'm trying to do that now. When I run the program, it prompts me to insert an 18gm flash drive, which I do (32gb to be exact). It then says it's "evaluating hardware", then tells me there was a problem running the program and closes.

Is there a way around this? I need to do a recovery on the hard drive, but I don't want to revert back to Windows 8. If any other information is needed, I'll gladly suppy it. Thank you in advance.

[Paul_Tikkanen · Accepted solution]

Hi:

If you are running the HP recovery manager to create recovery media, the recovery media you are trying to create would be for W8.

Since you previously upgraded your PC to W10, you can clean install W10 for free at any time by using the Media Creation Tool at the link below.

You can create a USB installation media flash drive (you will need an 8 GB flash drive for this).

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10

If you are asked to enter a product key during the installation, check the 'Skip' box, and W10 will install and automatically activate once you are connected to the internet.

Then you can install the drivers and available software from your notebook's support page.

https://support.hp.com/us-en/product/HP-15-Notebook-PC-series/6875200/model/7174336

[GTifeld]

Hi Paul,

Thank you so much for your response. That was very helpful. I just have one more question.

I went into the BIOS to change the boot order, but it still seems to be booting directly into Windows. When I start the laptop, I don't see any prompts (i.e. Hit a key to boot from USB/CD/etc.) or anything like that. It just goes straight into Windows as usual.

Am I missing something? Thanks again for your help.

--- Gary

[Paul_Tikkanen]

You're very welcome, Gary.

If you made a USB installation flash drive, have it plugged in to one of the notebook's two USB 2 ports.

Turn on, or restart the PC.

At the beginning of the HP welcome screen, tap the ESC key and you should get a menu of options.

Select the F9 boot options menu, and from that, select the USB flash drive (or USB hard drive if so labeled), and press the Enter key.

Now, the PC should boot from the W10 installation media you created.

[GTifeld]

Hi Paul,

i followed your instructions. I hit the "ESC" key on startup, then selected "F9 - Boot Device Options". On the next screen, my  only choices were "OS boot Manager" or "Boot From EFI File". The first option took me into Windows normally. The 2nd option listed a volume label with gibberish that I didn't recognize. At no point did it give me the option of choosing a CD or USB drive. 

As I said before, i already changed the boot priority order in the BIOS so it would boot from one of those dirves first, but it still goes straight into Windows.

Any help you could offer would be greatly appreciated. Thank you again.

Regards,

--- Gary

[Paul_Tikkanen]

Hi, Gary:

The only other suggestion I can offer would be to enable legacy mode in the BIOS and disable secure boot.

Hopefully the USB flash drive will show up then.

If not, then unfortunately, I don't have any other suggestions for you to try.

See this link for the settings to change...

https://www.support.hp.com/us-en/document/c03736054/

[GTifeld]

That did it!!!! Thank you once again, Paul. i so appreciate your time and assistance. Have a great night (or day).

Best regards,

--- Gary

[Paul_Tikkanen]

You're very welcome, Gary.

Glad that changing the BIOS settings worked for you.

You have a great night too.

Paul