I own a Sony Vaio laptop that came loaded with Vista. Last week, the computer crashed (blue screen), after numerous attempts to go into Safe Mode, I finally was able to make it run again. However, the hard drive is VERY VERY slow, thus, I want to re-install a fresh version of Vista. I made 2 recovery DVDs and when I boot with them, it takes me to the Windows screen. One of the options is to re-install Vista and bring it back to original factory settings. I get the following error message
"Cannot find a valid backup of your computer".

I remember that in the past, my HD was partionned in 2. The second part was for the system and the main part for everything else, this is how it came. Now, the system part has dissapeared since I had the crush.

I tried EVERYTHING, including system restore (which it can't do, because it says there are no restore points... once again, doesn't make sense because every time I've installed updates, it created a restore point)

Any suggestions? I really need to re-install Vista and format my HD.

Have you contacted Sony and requested the Restore DVD's ? ?
This may be the best alternative if the Recovery partition is damaged or wiped...

Normally there is only a small shipping fee involved.

I was able to make the recovery DVD myself... Isn't that the same thing?

When I use the recovery DVD to bootup, it takes me to the following:

How to automatically repair Windows Vista using Startup Repair

and since I don't have a backup image, I can't re-install Vista