Solved Rescue Disc and OS reinstall for Laptop

My father recently bought an Asus Notebook with 8.1. It just struck me that it came with no discs of any kind. (Is this par for the course with laptop purchases?) What does he do if his computer can't be started normally and if 8.1 needs to be reinstalled?

Thanks as always.

The best thing to do if you have rescue disc or not is to download the free Macrium Reflect. Once a month you make an image of your hard drive and put it on an external. No matter what happens you have an up to date image to use.
No need to reinstall software etc.
http://www.macrium.com/reflectfree.aspx
It has saved me twice.

Macrium can be used to replace a corrupted OS or just all the files and programs on the laptop. If not, how does one reinstall 8.1 if they have no disc and what should be done for a rescue disc?

All you need is Macrium. Lets say you cannot boot. You will have a Macrium CD. You boot from the CD, which lets you choose the Macrium Image that you want to use. Bingo, you are reinstalled with the image.

So what you backed up on the CD can be used to replace the entire system? Let's say you can't boot because your OS has been corrupted. The image on the CD brings computer back to how it was functioning when you backed things up? Would I be wrong in thinking that's pretty remarkable?

You are correct, with one exception. Not a CD, you should use and external hard drive. The image is way too large for a CD. Once you have Macrium, you will be given the option to download a CD, to help when you cannot boot. Its all free.
http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/73828-imaging-free-macrium.html

My father has a seagate external drive. Can he just periodically plug that in and save the entire system or files? Is the point of Macrium that you can save your system and programs rather than just files?

Checking out the tutorial now.

I would save the entire drive. In case of problems, you go back to where you were before the problem.

Hi,

Do you have the option to create the recovery discs?

See here for how to do it!

ASUSTeK Computer Inc. -Support- Troubleshooting U56E

I've been looking into this and it appears that you can reset the laptop through the recovery partition by tapping f9 and going through the steps but it would also seem that a recovery or starting disc would be needed if your system didn't want to boot on its own. And, of course, a recovery will not save your files and programs.

Thanks for the replies.

Lottiemansion said:

Hi,

Do you have the option to create the recovery discs?

See here for how to do it!

ASUSTeK Computer Inc. -Support- Troubleshooting U56E

Click to expand...

Thanks. My father's notebook doesn't have the DVD recovery option and although I know I can boot with f9 to start the recovery process I wondered what one's to do if the system is corrupted to the point you can't do the f9 process. I just read that you can use a usb flash drive to copy the recovery partition which I guess you can use if the f9 process is not working.