Confused On What I Need To Restore To Out-Of-Box - Series 7 Chronos 17.3" NP700Z7C

Hi all,

I bought a Series 7 Chronos 17.3" NP700Z7C-S01US at Best Buy a couple of months ago. It has windows 7 64 bit on it. I am confused on what I need to have to restore this computer to the out-of-box state if something bad happens. My computer is running fine now, btw.

I saw the restore disc that came with the computer, and assumed that was all I needed, but when I was looking something else up about the computer, I found some people who had posted that the restore disc was Windows only and no system software, thy had trouble with the SSD, etc. What the heck was Samsung thinking?

I am having a hard time really understanding what I need in Samsung Restore, and I did a search and didn't find much. Can anyone help me prepare now for a disaster later?

Thanks,
Gina

 

IMO (others may differ) having used that restore disc, if you ever need to use it, I'd have a copy of the wifi drivers for your model and a copy of the SW updater (you could download the SW updater after once you have the wifi running, but I'd say it would be handy to have it from the gecko). Once you've run the SW updater you can choose what software you want, most would download the Easy Settings, Easy Software manager, Easy Support Cente and the Recovery Solutions. But I would say you only really need the Easy Settings because they have all the Fn keys functions, personally I have no Samsung software installed on my laptop (because I don't use the Fn keys) and it runs well, again many would differ.

 

@ginakra: This post should give you an idea on what to backup (that was a link).

Doing everything listed there is kind of extreme, but will allow you to restore the PC to "new state", even if you wipe the entire HDD (say if you ever wanted to sell it).

The preferred way to restore the PC to its "Factory State" is to boot the Recovery Partition on the HDD (hit F4 after Power On) and chose the Complete Restore function in there.

You are correct, the included DVD is just a Windows 7 SP1 Home Premium and allows you to make a clean install. I actually like having an "unbloated" Windows disk.

In order to install Samsung drivers and utilities (called System Software in Samsung lingo) you need to install SW Update (what used to be Easy Software Manager). It will look for the Recovery Partition on the HDD and install drivers and utilities from there. You can choose from a list which to install.

The most important backup step is to use Samsung Recovery Solution to make a backup of that System Software to a DVD. It makes installing Windows anew incredibly simple compared to other laptops: You just insert that DVD, which loads Easy Software Manager and automatically installs everything for you.

Hope that clarifies

 

Thanks to both of you, for your replies

So I already had Paragon Hard Disk Manager 12 on this machine. I used it on my former machine to backup the hard drive, and so I installed on this computer. It shows the following as to how the drives and partitions exist on my machine:



I have never had an ssd and don't know much about them. I assume I have one regular hard drive in there, that has three partitions:

System @ 100MB
Local Disk C: @ 908.2GB
Samsung_Rec @ 23.1GB

And the SSD drive, @ 7.4GB

So on the "extreme" thread, Dannemand, I need to have a copy of the Samsung_Rec partition, and a copy of the System partition. Then just be able to recreate the partitions to copy them to if I have to format the entire drive, correct? I believe this program has a boot disc that would allow me to make the partitions.

So what to do to the SSD? Anything? What is the SSD for? Do I even need to back this up for disaster proofing, or general weekly backups? If I were to sell, would I have to wipe that too?

What is the System partition? Excuse my ignorance, but I've never had a computer with this many partitions on it, and an ssd. I'm not sure what to backup, why, or why not, and if I were to sell this computer and wipe the whole shebang, what I should NOT copy back to the hard drive (other than my own data of course). I know the data in Samsung_Rec is just the data they use to restore the computer, but the System partition, could it contain personal data?

I have already backed up the system software onto a disk, but just to make sure, I will download the wi-fi drivers and SW Updater you suggested, HerEsY

If you haven't been able to tell, I'm on the Extreme end of backing up However, I really like having a CD I can just pop in and it bring me to the state it was when I bought it. Less work.

Thanks,
Gina

 

@Gina:

I am waiting for my meeting, this will have to be a fast one:

1) No need to backup the SSD: Its purpose is only to serve as cache for the HDD, using the ExpressCache software. Some users have problems with it when they perform clean installs or upgrades of Windows (installing from DVD mostly takes care of that). As long as you don't have problems, just leave it.

2) The 100MB SYSTEM partition is created by Windows and the one actually used to boot. Again, some users have problems with this one when they perform clean installs (and not doing it from DVD). It's not a bad idea to save a Paragon image of this partition, though chances are you'll never need it.

3) The Recovery Partition is the one containing the original factory installation (called Initial Image). I strongly recommend you don't delete that partition -- even if you decide to make a new installation. Saving a Paragon image of it is a good idea. If your disk ever gets wiped, it can help restoring it (although JUST restoring this image from a backup probably won't get it fully working again, some other steps may be needed).

4) I also advice that you create that USB Admin Tool described in the post I linked in my first response. It can make all the difference if your HDD gets borked and you need to re-create your Recovery Partition.

The only way to fully restore the entire disk to "factory state" is to boot into Recovery (F4) and use the Complete Restore function in there. Unfortunately there is no way to create a backup disk to do the exact same thing (which I agree would be ideal). The closest option is a new Windows install and adding System Software using the backup you already created -- but this merely re-creates the Windows installation, not the entire HDD.

So protecting that Recovery Partition is your best option if you want to be able to get the PC back to "new state".

I really have to go now. I'll check back later to see if I missed something.