Recover Window 10

[Alby74]

Good morning,

i have an HP envy17 2090el. 

i have bought it different years ago and it had window 7 as operating system. Then i updated the operationg sistem to Window 10.

Today my laptop is not able to load window 10 . if i press "esc" while window 10 is trying to load the HP recovery manager starts.

Will the recovery manager recover window 10 or it will recover window 7?

thank you

Alberto

[Paul_Tikkanen]

Hi, Alberto:

If the recovery manager works, it will install W7.

If you previously had upgraded to W10 and it was successfully activated, you can go right back to W10 by using the Media creation tool at the link below and clean install W10.

When you get to the window during the installation process where you are asked to input a product key, select the 'I don't have a product key' option, and W10 will install and automatically reactivate once you are connected to the internet.

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

[Alby74]

Thank you Paul,

W10 is asciated with my Hp laptop, therefore i shoul be fine.

will i have to backup my files before recovering w10? or is there a way to maintain them ?

ty

Alberto

[Paul_Tikkanen]

You're very welcome, Alberto.

You should back up any files you don't want to lose, because doing a clean install you will have to reinstall your files and programs.

Now, you don't have to format the hard drive.  You can let windows install over the current installation, and it will create a windows.old folder.

Once W10 is reinstalled, you can explore the Windows.old folder, and in your user directory, you can copy and paste the files and folders in that directory to the new installation.

But I would still back them up anyway.

Once you are sure you have everything you want from the windows.old folder, you can delete it by using the disk cleanup utility.

Run it and when it comes to the disk cleanup window, click on the cleanup system files button and it will run again and then you can check the boxes to delete the files including the windows.old folder.

[Alby74]

ty Paul,

i just noticed that media creation cannot find my USB  flash drive (while i can see it in my laptop). I have 3 usb flash drives  (4 gb each) and none of them can be fond by media creation

[Paul_Tikkanen · Accepted solution]

Hi:

The media creation tool will download the ISO file to your PC's hard drive.

Then you use this tool to transfer the file to your USB flash drive.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/windows-usb-dvd-download-tool