Returning Pavilion g4 to "out of the box"

[bdjsay]

I want to return this laptop to it's "out of the box" condition in order to sell it.  I haven't been able to find how to do this.  I'm assuming the Recovery partition should contain the needed files.

[WAWood · Accepted solution]

@bdjsay 
You didn't say which model G4 you have -- and some of them came with Win7 preinstalled, not Win10.

If yours is one of those, or if it had Win8x on it, then your Upgrade to Win10 trashed the HP Recovery information, making a factory reset not possible, anymore.

To so this now, you would have to purchase something known as HP Recovery Media ...

HP Recovery Media is a set of DVDs and a CD, or USB stick, that will erase the hard drive (removing all data, settings, and applications, reinstall the original OS, drivers, and some HP Utilities.

In some cases, you may be able to order a USB stick instead of disks. You have to order these from HP; they can not be downloaded.

You can look online for Recovery Media starting with the linked paged: http://support.hp.com/us-en/drivers

Once there, input your Product name or number. On your Software and Drivers Download page, select your Operating System and and Version. Click "Update".

If HP Recovery Media is available for your machine, down near the bottom of the page, you will see an entry for Order Recovery Media-CD/DVD/USB. Click the "+" symbol to expand that entry and click on Order Media for details.

Or, if you prefer, you can do the same by contacting HP Customer Service:

If you live in the US or Canada, contact information is on this page: http://www8.hp.com/us/en/contact-hp/phone-assist.html#section1

If you live elsewhere, contact information is on this page: http://www8.hp.com/us/en/contact-hp/ww-contact-us.html

NOTE: After you get through, stay on the line until you are finally able to talk to some one -- it can take a while!

If you have trouble finding a phone number, then try: 1 (650) 857-1501.

If HP no longer provides Recovery Media for your model, another site you can check is: http://www.computersurgeons.com

When you get the media, if it is a USB stick, insert it into your PC, pressing F9 to get a Boot menu, then select the External USB Hard Drive to boot from it.

[bdjsay]

Yes, it did originally come with Windows 7, that explains why I couldn't recover it.  Thanks for the tip.  It seems it's too old to get anything from HP.  So on to Plan B.  Thank you again.