Hard drive failure - how to restore Windows 8?

MarkBargain

My friend gave me a laptop to look at which would not boot. It's clearly a hard drive failure, as when I take the hard drive out it will boot to Ubuntu on a USB flash drive. So, needs a new hard drive. The trouble is the laptop came with Windows 8, so is there any way to get that back? My friend does not have restore discs? If not, the best I can do is to put in a new hard drive and install Ubuntu.

Leo2020

You might be able to buy a restore disk from the manufacturer. You should be able to install windows from this disk.

NiftyDigits

No need to buy a Restore disc, you can just download an image. What's the full model number of the machine?

chris105

If windows 8 came with the laptop it will be an OEM version of windows, you will have to download the OEM image if you intend to use the same Product Key. Recently however Microsoft has been removing sites that offer an OEM image of its operating system, you will have to use bit torrent to obtain a OEM image (I recently did the same for Win 7 professional).

NiftyDigits

chris105 wrote: »

If windows 8 came with the laptop it will be an OEM version of windows, you will have to download the OEM image if you intend to use the same Product Key. Recently however Microsoft has been removing sites that offer an OEM image of its operating system, you will have to use bit torrent to obtain a OEM image (I recently did the same for Win 7 professional).

You need to stop....

colin79666

chris105 wrote: »

you will have to use bit torrent to obtain a OEM image (I recently did the same for Win 7 professional).

Not strictly true. You can legally download a recovery image from Microsoft themselves.
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-8/create-reset-refresh-media

bsod

The fact a machine can boot to linux from a usb drive when the hard disk is removed doesn't indicate a hard drive failure, they can all do that.

What happens with it in?

googler

Have you tried the HDD in a caddy, connected to another machine?

MarkBargain

My friend has informed me that the laptop is still under guarantee, so I expect they can get it repaired under that.

The hard drive makes a loud clicking noise and it says no device to boot from, so I thought it probably is a hard drive failure.

bsod

in that case you are probably correct,,, was just making sure you didn't go down the wrong path

MarkBargain

bsod wrote: »

in that case you are probably correct,,, was just making sure you didn't go down the wrong path

Thanks. Sorry, I should have put that in my original post. I wrote it in a hurry as I was going out!