Factory reset not working

Hi everyone, I am having trouble with my HP Compaq presario c700 Vista factory reset.

The 120Gb HD has a 12 Gb recovery partition. I recently installed Ubuntu which worked fine, but now have decided to dual boot back with Vista. In trying the recovery partition I get to the 'factory image recovery' then there are 2 check boxes.

1st is 'reformatting the windows part of your hard disc drive' - which is checked,
2nd is 'reinstalling the original content' - which is unchecked.

The progress bar shows 0% and the error that comes up is
"Error. 0x4001100 20000 100A
If this issue continues please contact HP support"

It seems to be stalling on the reformatting part. As I have played with the paritions on the HD is it possible this is why it is not working? (The HDD is working fine, and Ubuntu works).

All my files are backed up, so I am anticipating Vista wiping the HD during install anyway, and then re-partition and install Ubuntu again afterwards.

Thanks

 

To clarify, you installed Ubuntu over the Vista partition thus wiping vista. And now, you are wanting vista back so you can dual boot the two Operating Systems.

You said you have your data backed up, so what happens when you delete all the partitions except for the Recovery Partition? The Recovery Partition should re-create the partitions as they were from the factory. I have done this many times on HP and eMachine PC's. Once you have your Vista Machine back running again the OS partition can be shrunk down allowing for the Ubuntu install on a different partition.

If you need help deleting the partitions, MiniTool Partition Wizard Home will help. It's freeware and also bootable if you download the bootable version from the download page.

 

Yep, everything you've said is what I intend to do.

Nothing happens when the partitions are deleted, I just can't boot to the recovery partition. I can only access it when I have an OS installed and it comes up in the boot loader menu (currently ubuntu).

New revelations, I tried to install an old XP and it says it can't detect a hard disc. Now the Vista recovery is coming up with an error code which having googled it suggests a hard disc problem. I thought previously that it was because the windows ntfs partition was no longer there, but now with this XP message, perhaps the recovery partition isn't seeing it either.

Ubuntu installs fine and detects the hd fine. I have checked the disc in Ubuntu and through the BIOS and there are no problems there.

Currently I'm trying to make a Vista install disc using Winbuilder and WAIK from the recovery partition, and if that works then I'll try booting from the DVDs.

 

Have you tried flagging the Recovery Partition as the active partition. This would allow you to boot the Recovery Partition. It has worked for me every time and hopefully it will for you too.

 

Hi Clifford thanks for your replies,

how do you flag it as the active parition? I was previously editing the partitions in G-parted through a ubuntu live session. That's now not working however because of a windows recovery disk (no installation files) writing over its boot files...

Thanks

 

The freeware I mentioned above will allow you to do this.

Download and create the Partition Wizard Home Bootdisk.

 

Ah, correct me if I'm wrong but I think this may be called 'changing the boot flag' in gparted (for linux), which I've already tried.

Winbuilder and WAIK are not proving to be easy to get results with so far...

Anyone any experience with them?