Asus desktops: Don't buy or read this first

robmar0se

A client brought in an Asus Windows 8 desktop, with a faulty hdd, the recovery partition (F9) was inoperable. The options I thought were:

1. new HDD and get the recovery disks
2. as for 1 but get new Win 8 media
3. Buy a new PC

The PC is only 18 months old and the WD software indicated bad sectors and was duff, do you want to chuck an 18 month old PC?

calling Asus I got the following and I quote

Unfortunately we do not have recovery media available for desktops.

So if you buy an Asus desktop make bl***y sure you create the recovery media (in Asus case you need to download the backtracker program, its not even installed when you buy). But then most consumers don't, do they? Caveat Emptor

PS Of course there is the sale of goods act, but that takes time......

jbainbridge

I would have thought you could -
- Create a W8.1 DVD from http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-8/create-reset-refresh-media
- Install to new HD
- Obtain necessary drivers from ASUS website

I'd prefer this as the most recent ASUS machine I set up had loads of bloatware on it.

Stoke

I've had two Asus laptops that have been fine and worked perfectly for years now. The only thing I found with Asus was that both had some rather odd non-standard components which meant using them with Linux was a bit finicky, in particular they used a very strange Intel chipset which meant I was unable to get a GPU driver, which meant I could only ever use the Generic Software VGA Adapter (forget hardware acceleration, or smooth scrolling).

Still, on Windows the laptop has been excellent and very very good value for money.

You might just have had a bad one, it happens.

Fightsback

Sorry but HDDs are notorious for failing just about any time, always make backups and as others have pointed out W8 recovery media is available from Microsoft for OEM unlike W7.

Your "client" has learnt a painful lesson on backing up, move forward and hopefully they have learned from their experience.

robmar0se

jbainbridge wrote: »

I would have thought you could -
- Create a W8.1 DVD from http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-8/create-reset-refresh-media
- Install to new HD
- Obtain necessary drivers from ASUS website

I'd prefer this as the most recent ASUS machine I set up had loads of bloatware on it.

thanks - I considered this but I thought I read that you need to COA, which I also understand is not recoverable from OEM systems.

Maybe I'm wrong?

The main point in my post is that Asus does not provide recovery media for desktops, which in my view is diabolical!

jbainbridge

Windows 8 reads the key from the BIOS so you'll have no problems.

You can 'read' the key from within Windows but there is no need to.

poppy10_2

robmar0se wrote: »

I thought I read that you need to COA, which I also understand is not recoverable from OEM systems.

The main point in my post is that Asus does not provide recovery media for desktops, which in my view is diabolical!

Hardly anybody provides recovery media these days. Plus Microsoft stopped using CoAs with Windows 8; the OEM key is embedded in the BIOS and is automatically picked up by Windows without you having to enter it. Get with the times, grandad.

Download the installation media directly from Microsoft and install it. There's a guide here if you are sturggling, but really you shouldn't be in this business if you don't know this basic stuff.

robmar0se

poppy10 wrote: »

Hardly anybody provides recovery media these days. Plus Microsoft stopped using CoAs with Windows 8; the OEM key is embedded in the BIOS and is automatically picked up by Windows without you having to enter it. Get with the times, grandad.

Ok young man not so much of the grandad! hee hee....
Yea we all know that MS stopped putting COA on the machines and its in the BIOS, not quite that antique......yet.

I didn't know that most OEMs have stopped providing recovery disks, in the case of Asus they were specific about desktops, this implies that they do for other machines? It does say on the Asus site that they have stopped providing recovery disks for win7.

However the number of hdd fails on relatively new Win 8 machines is not common so you will forgive me if I am learning things here. I will try jbainbridges suggestion, as I may learn something.

Just remember the guy who thinks he knows all, maybe has something to learn...........:)

Uxb

My Samsung N140 netbook did not have a recovery disk and this was from I think in 2010 on win XP.

You were warned specifically to do a full external backup to an external USB DVD drive (in your supply!) ASAP - and Samsung provided their own software (recovery solution) to do it.
Precisely because if the HDD failed then the recovery partition would be inaccessible to you as well.

Fightsback

robmar0se wrote: »

Just remember the guy who thinks he knows all, maybe has something to learn...........:)

He who asks a question is a fool for five minutes; he who does not ask a question remains a fool forever.

poppy10_2

robmar0se wrote: »

I didn't know that most OEMs have stopped providing recovery disks, in the case of Asus they were specific about desktops, this implies that they do for other machines?

Yes. Many laptops these days don't even come with DVD drives so there is no point having a recovery DVD for them.