Re-imaging issues on Windows 8

[bootysalad]

Hi,
I recently had my repaired HP laptop returned to me wiped, and I want to restore from a system image. I've gone to advanced restart settings, clicked on my detected system image off my external hard drive and clicked Next.

However I'm getting this error message: "To restore this computer, Windows needs to format the drive that the Windows Recovery environment is currently running on. To continue with the restore shut down this computer and boost it from a Windows installation disc or a system repair disc and then try the restore again," and so I can't restore it.

The problem is, I don't have an optical drive so I don't know how to do this - I just wiped it and factory reset it but I'm still getting the message. And another thing, I'm not sure if this may be part of the problem or not, but the laptop came back to me running Windows 8.1 instead of the Windows 10 I handed to them.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[webworkings]

Well they may have reset it back to the original OS rather than a upgraded one. It happens. Especially if they have to wipe something.

If you don't have a CD/DVD drive, do you have a USB? Assuming yes. You can do a reinstall from a USB drive, just make sure that the OS is burned onto the USB drive rather than just copied, as then it probably won't work.

You can get copies of the different versions of Windows via these links...

Windows 7 ... https/www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows7

Windows 8.1 ... https/www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows8

Windows 10 ... https/www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10

 

[bootysalad]

Well they may have reset it back to the original OS rather than a upgraded one. It happens. Especially if they have to wipe something.

If you don't have a CD/DVD drive, do you have a USB? Assuming yes. You can do a reinstall from a USB drive, just make sure that the OS is burned onto the USB drive rather than just copied, as then it probably won't work.

You can get copies of the different versions of Windows via these links...

Windows 7 ... https/www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows7

Windows 8.1 ... https/www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows8

Windows 10 ... https/www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10

Thanks heaps for your quick response, I created a bootable drive using the Windows 10 link you gave and I successfully booted from it. I went back to advanced restart settings to try and get back my old files from the system image I have saved, but I'm getting the same error message

EDIT: All good! I plugged in my external HDD with the system image saved on it, and just clicked on the system image. It's just restoring everything right now, thanks for your help!

 

[webworkings]

Glad to hear it.