The Recovery Disc Rip-Off 551
nk497 writes "The chances of finding a recovery disc at the bottom of a PC box is getting slimmer, as vendors instead take the cheaper option of installing recovery software on a hard disk partition, leaving the buyer with no physical copy of the operating system they paid for if (or when) the hard disk fails. Users can burn a backup disc, but many aren't as diligent as they should be. While some PC vendors will offer a free or cheap disc at the time of purchase, buying one — or even tracking one down — after the fact can be expensive and take weeks to arrive. 'I've had a lot of people that have had this problem,' said David Smith, director of independent maintenance company Help With Your PC. 'One customer recently found his hard drive had gone, but by the time he'd paid £50 for the recovery disc, paid for a new hard drive and paid for the labour of installing the device, it made more sense to buy a new machine.'"
It's down to the cost of one disk? (Score:4, Insightful)
That's how close we're watching costs these days?
Re:It's down to the cost of one disk? (Score:5, Interesting)
That's how close we're watching costs these days?
In an industry where one is expected to lower your retails costs by 25% every year simply to stay competitive, I can't say I blame them.
If they could fit enough into the BIOS to have it connect to their servers and redownload your OS in case of drive failure, why the hell not go that route? One less plastic disk the world doesn't need.
Re:It's down to the cost of one disk? (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't see why they don't do this anyways. And they don't need the BIOS to do it.
You have your serial number on the sticker on the box. The OEM license discs won't take the non-OEM serial.
Just publish the ISO image to their FTP site, say "here it is, download/burn it wherever", and be done with it.
The real answer is that their "built-in burn your own backup" software is a ruse: first they fuck you over not including a real recovery disc separate from the hard drive, then the OEMs (Dell especially) spam ads all over the fucking screen about buying the "upgraded backup software which will back up your personal documents" while you wait for it to burn the fucking DVD at 0.5x speeds.
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Re:It's down to the cost of one disk? (Score:4, Interesting)
If the burn even works. I have a Compaq laptop that came preloaded with Windows Vista. Tried burning the recovery because I wanted to wipe the drive, reclaim my 8 gigs by deleting the recovery partition, and install Ubuntu. It would get through 99% of the burn and then just fail randomly. After going through half a dozen DVD-R's, I just gave up.
I had this happen with an HP too.
On a side note, I ended up giving it away. It overheated too much and would freeze or shutdown. I had to use external cooling from an over-sized fan with everything placed next to the window on a cold night. The recipient placed in on two ice packs for setting up Windows.
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Yours too? I've got an HP Pavilion DV6000-series that's nearly as bad. If I don't prop the back end up (the fans point down and to the back, rather than just back--WTF sense does that make???) it overheats and shuts down if I play a flash video in full screen. Hell, sometimes it does anyway. It's a pretty high-end laptop, or was at the time, but gaming is only a possibility in the winter with the thermostat set on 60.
Re:It's down to the cost of one disk? (Score:5, Insightful)
> And just how the fuck do you expect a presumably novice computer user to just download an ISO image somewhere and burn it? You might as well tell them to use Linux; it would be just about as useless to them.
If the old OS is any good, it will be made easy for him.
If the old OS is crap, then he's got extra incentive to dump it.
There is no good reason why burning an ISO in 2010 should be hard in any OS.
Re:It's down to the cost of one disk? (Score:5, Insightful)
To add a ten-year old gripe to that, why is it that the web browser and the media player are "part of the operating system", but hardware support for CD burning didn't come along until XP, and support for common cd standards, such as ISO format still hasn't become common?
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But... even when the manufacturer TELLS people straight up to burn the backup DVD with the provided software, most people just don't do it. I don't see why they'd be more likely to burn an image that they'd have to download it.
Re:It's down to the cost of one disk? (Score:4, Insightful)
>>>I can't say I blame them.
I can. It's cheaper for them to run-off a million or so DVD Restore Discs, with discounted pricing, then for me to run to the store, buy a DVD blank, and record a restore disc. (That's what my new HP Compaq computer expects me to do.) I'd rather pay an extra 10 cents on the purchase price and get the disc.
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I have a better idea.. Why make DELL eat the cost. Microsoft can get off their asses and ship dell 22 billion OS install DVD's Those asshats are raking in the money faster.. How about dell having the balls to tell MSFT to shove it and supply install Discs.
Honestly Michael Dell rolls over for Ballmer every time. Get some ca-hones Mikey! Microsoft will feel it pretty hard if you tell them to go pound sand.
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Why the hell do people keep thinking this?
It's not that the cost of a CD is prohibitive or adding anything it the cost.
It's that someone figured out they can charge more for the CD if they don't include it in the standard price!
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And yet somehow my local chain store can sell me a DVD movie complete with plastic case and fancy jacket for under ten bucks... and profit from it.
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yes, and somehow the dollar store sells re-pressings of older TV movies on DVD for $1 a piece, and profits from it.
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AOL can spam the entire country with CDs through the snail mail. Companies like Dell have manufacturing processes down to an exact science. It's not that big of a cost. No really, it isn't.
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Re:It's down to the cost of one disk? (Score:5, Insightful)
The stickler in this is that crapware merchants pay PC vendors to have their stuff shoveled onto machines, so it will be present everywhere unless one installs from true OS media. So shipping true Windows media isn't in the PC company's best interest because it means fewer installs and fewer chances of getting handed cash when someone upgrades or activates the crapware.
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From what I see, people end up registering the stuff that pops up in order to get it to shut up. The usual antivirus program for example that pops up notices that the end of the world will happen because it will stop getting new definitions in 30 days. If they knew better, they would be pulling that stuff out and installing Microsoft Security Essentials which is provided by MS at no charge, but provides as good AV protection as everyone else.
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In an industry where one is expected to lower your retails costs by 25% every year simply to stay competitive, I can't say I blame them.
Am I really the only one who would rather they put prices up by 25%, but supplied reliable hardware and a clean OS installation with original media?
I would be perfectly willing to pay a higher price in exchange for good quality products, where the hardware doesn't fail after only a year or two, the drivers don't get abandoned because a new OS I don't care about came out six months later, the software doesn't routinely crash or leak sensitive data, etc. Unfortunately, hardly anyone in this business seems to
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+1. Even if the cost was 50% more so the PC makers can actually provide the following:
A decent quality level of components. Caps ready to bust are so 2000-2002.
A level of phone tech support that is decent (no script readers that hang up on the customer if they can't find where to go on the flowchart).
Printed manuals. PDF files don't do squat when there is no machine to read them.
CD-ROM media, as well as read-only USB flash drives so machines without CD-ROM drives can be recovered.
Ideally, a purchased PC
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It's about double for a similarly-sounding spec.
That sounds like either you're being ripped off by your suppliers on the good stuff or you have access to cheaper cheap stuff than here in the UK. Every self-build system I've put together in the past decade had a 25–50% premium over what I could have ordered on-line from a large-scale manufacturer, but I don't think any were any worse than that (and they were all cheaper than what I could have bought off the shelf from the local PC World or similar retail outlets).
That said, I would happily even pay
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For anyone not Apple. Look at what happened with Dell. Basically since 2005 they made almost nothing on PC sales. Something like 70% of their operating income came from kick backs from Intel. It's one of the reasons why I don't buy PC's these days. It's been a race to the bottom and to see who can cut the most corners without completely going under.
Re:It's down to the cost of one disk? (Score:5, Informative)
Actually no. I was going to build my own system for my video editor replacement. But I could not touch the price of buying a prebuilt ASUS PC and the parts to upgrade it.
for the exact same hardware I could not buy my i7 processor, motherboard, and 8 gig of ram for the price of the same + case+DVD drive+1TB hard drive + Win7 license..
Either Newegg is price gouging, or the pc makers are really undercutting everyone. Plus I got a Win7 OEM license I was able to sell for $100.00... Oh and ASUS gives you a Microsoft OS install DVD.. and the COA sticker peels off easily because it was too new to set.
Re:It's down to the cost of one disk? (Score:5, Insightful)
That's how close we're watching costs these days?
No - this is part of "encouraging" people to buy a new PC instead of fixing their old PC. Today, I am finding people that are throwing away dual and quad core PCs because the repair costs are so high.
Microsoft go out of their way [microsoft.com] to ensure that refurbishers can't just reinstall the original version of Windows. They make it difficult for consumers to reimage their PCs easily.
If they did that, who would buy a new PC?
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They don't burn a different image for each machine shipped. Not even each model shipped. I recently had to restore two Dell machines. Each came with a base Windows disk with a bunch of different base drivers for a bunch of different machines. Then came the drivers disk, which supported a bunch of different models as well. Each of those two disks probably supported hundreds of different models.
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Having spent more time than I'd care to think about digging through those backup DVDs for drivers, they generally only support one model, occasionally two or three. The reason there are so many drivers on the disc is because a given model usually has dozens of different configuration options, eg 4 or 5 different graphics cards, 3 or 4 different NICs, etc. However, each disc is usually locked to a single model, and does some sort of check that prevents it from running on any other model even if it has all
Gotta wonder... (Score:5, Insightful)
why can't MS have easy to get iso's for windows (Score:3, Insightful)
why can't MS have easy to get iso's for windows that just need your key that is on the COA so you don't need to torrent the iso?
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Re:why can't MS have easy to get iso's for windows (Score:5, Informative)
They don't seem to advertise it, but they do. Digitalreiver hosts it for them:
http://www.mydigitallife.info/2009/10/25/windows-7-64-bit-x64-direct-download-links/ [mydigitallife.info]
You require a license to use it, of course, but that is the software.
Re:why can't MS have easy to get iso's for windows (Score:5, Informative)
You can just order the disk alone from Microsoft at the Microsoft Supplemental Parts center. 800-360-7561
Re:why can't MS have easy to get iso's for windows (Score:5, Insightful)
Remember when you got a copy of the standard installation discs with the PC? You could get the OS installation, not a modified and customized imaging-only type of CD but a full installation disc. Microsoft got the idea that if you had that disc, you would install it on many computers even though it was illegal to do so. Then came the custom installation or imaging CD which only worked on your computer or one exactly like it. Windows activation followed and then the elimination of the CD all together and only a recovery partition which was tied to your boot sector so installing Linux or any other OS or boot manager meant your recovery sector was useless.
To follow Microsoft's marketing speak, 'Customers have asked for a simpler way to install Microsoft Windows and we believe putting the software on the fastest media, the hard disk, is what's best for the customer.' It's all bull and more talk to best scrap your wallet clean. IMO
Me, I just download an ISO from ubuntu.com, linuxmint.com, fedoraproject.org, opensuse.org, knoppix.net, etc and move on.
LoB
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It gets worse: many so-called Vista “OEM” keys on laptops will only work with the manufacturer's recovery disc, and won't work with a legitimate (but generic) OEM disc. In three instances, I've had to give up and tell clients they'll have to cough up the $40 and buy a recovery disc because I just couldn't get Windows to activate otherwise.
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OEM Windows WILL activate online, it doesn't always though. Sometimes you do have to ring up, usually if the number has been activated too many times but sometimes just straight off the bat.
To say that the OEM keys are specific to a particular OEM and that you need the disc from that particular manufacturer is just utter codswallop. I've reinstalled literally hundreds of laptops, all from exactly the same set of ISO's
Ah the joys... (Score:2)
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Amen, brother, amen.
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being able to download my OS from the internet for free!
But then you have to be more diligent in choosing hardware for your PC. Sure, a Free operating system based on Linux (Fedora, Ubuntu, etc.) supports a wide array of hardware. But if you happen to buy a piece of hardware at the store that's not on the distribution's hardware compatibility list, it probably won't include a Linux driver on a disc either. Now what?
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Take Linux LiveCD to shop, test machine. Stop whining.
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Take Linux LiveCD to shop, test machine.
How many shops will unbox a PC that has no floor model to let me test it? Or (in the case of small form factor machines with no built-in optical drive) let me plug in a USB DVD-ROM drive? Or unbox a printer or scanner and let me connect it to a floor model PC?
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How many shops will unbox a PC that has no floor model to let me test it? Or (in the case of small form factor machines with no built-in optical drive) let me plug in a USB DVD-ROM drive?
Any store worth doing business worth, that's who.
If you are buying computers from an electronics/office supply store, you'll get ignored.
If you are buying from a real computer store, they know that they can't compete on price with newegg/amazon/etc, so they need to compete on service. The staff absolutely will unbox equipme
Re:Ah the joys... (Score:5, Informative)
You mean that you haven't noticed that Windows has a hardware compatibility list as well ?
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People that can actually research things.
I was smart enough that when I wanted a new webcam I used the internet thingy and searched. I found the Microsoft Lifecam HD works under Windows, Linux and OSX perfectly... yet the box says "WINDOWS ONLY!! HOW DARE YOU ASK ABOUT ANYTHING ELSE!!!!"
I used my brain and made a educated purchase. I guess those that are incapable of doing anything but looking at boxes get to miss out on a lot.
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Windows has a hardware compatibility list
Driver discs bundled with peripherals extend the hardware compatibility list of Windows because they include a driver for Windows. They do not extend the hardware compatibility list of Linux because they do not include a driver for Linux.
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Certain companies are still on the "bad list" -- Broadcom certainly stands out
So how do I discern, by looking only at the retail packaging, whether a particular peripheral contains a chipset from a company on the "bad list"? It'd be best if there were a central "good list" of manufacturer names somewhere on the web that I can recommend to friends and family who have grown tired of headaches associated with Windows. For example, HP printers and scanners would make the list. Does this exist?
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Or those who simply aren't savvy enough (most) or have better things to do (some) than wrangle with an OS or replace disks.
Most people have more money than sense, and they don't have much money either.
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>>>Most people have more money than sense
Or they recognize that it's silly to waste 3-4 hours trying to make a device work, when it only takes an hour of overtime to earn the cash and BUY the fix (like a new device). That's called common sense.
iTunes Plus (Score:2)
It doesn't help consumers who are already the victims of vendor lock-in, such as those with a large purchased iTunes music collection.
Was this large iTunes music collection purchased before or after Apple's transition to DRM-free iTunes Plus, which took place between mid-2007 and the end of 2008?
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But if you happen to buy a piece of hardware at the store that's not on the distribution's hardware compatibility list, it probably won't include a Linux driver on a disc either. Now what?
After that, I wake up and stop dreaming about the past.
Welcome to the 21st century.
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Welcome to the 21st century.
Unless I'm severely missing something, you're claiming that makers of PC peripherals, such as printers, scanners, and network cards, started putting Linux drivers on the included CD sometime in the past decade. Which year was this?
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You've already been told by the other guy but -
Compared to the latest incarnation of windows (7), linux is dreamlike for hardware compat. That scanner (and any accompanying printers) are more likely to work under linux, and without having to download a hundred megabytes of crap from a support site, if there's any support at all.
WLAN is a similar story and a friend has just had to go buy another card because he switched to win 7. And 3d is fine now, thanks.
Look, if you don't like linux for some reason then f
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it probably won't include a Linux driver on a disc either. Now what?
Well, there is the internet.
Actually, though, more often I find the opposite scenario to be true. Most hardware "just works" with Linux, but for Windows you need to install stuff from the included CD. You may be loading just a driver, or you might be installing whatever additional spyware/adware/nagware/crapware the hardware vendor (or some 3rd party) wants on your machine. But as long as it "works", you won't know or care.
I have nothing (well, a few things maybe) against Windows itself as an OS, but the ec
HP Does this ... (Score:5, Informative)
My wife recently bought an HP laptop. It comes with the recovery stuff on a partition.
You get one time you can burn a physical recovery disk. When we tried it, the process failed. Leaving you with no more tries at a recovery disk, and no recovery disk.
Very annoying. Combine that with the performance of the laptop, and we won't be buying anything else from HP because they're products are overpriced and crappy. Ripping a CD created MP3 with really bad jitter and noise -- lame for a dual core machine which wasn't doing anything else at the time.
Posting anonymously because my wife works for HP and we bought it using her discount. :-P
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> they're [sic] products are overpriced and crappy
> my wife works for HP
Due diligence again, why didn't you try something before you bought it.
People pretend like computers are like DVD players.
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The other piece about the HP recovery disks is that they are not an OS disk, but instead an image of the factory default install. I was hoping to have an image with base OS and drivers to get started. Instead I have a copy of all of the apps and other nonsense in the exact same configuration.
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The same thing happened with my mom. She's not really a tech-savvy user, but she doesn't go poking at things she doesn't understand, and the backup process wasn't exactly complicated. There was an error on the recovery partition and the backup puked.
We ended up getting a copy of Windows 7 to throw on it instead of the default Vista that it came with so she was out a few bucks but better off I guess.
Still, I find it extremely dickish of Toshiba to do such a thing.
What model? (Score:2)
What model was the laptop?
We usually buy the Compaq line from HP and that comes with physical media. The last laptop from them came with with 3 discs: Windows Vista, Windows XP downgrade and Drivers. That was last year.
Usually, I found real difference between their 'home' laptops and their 'business' ones.
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I learned that lesson with all PC makers. That is why if I get tasked with helping someone with a new PC, first thing I do is boot it from a Knoppix CD, plug in an external drive, and both tar and dd off the partitions. This gives me an image I know will work. Then I boot a TrueImage or MaxBlast CD and use that to image the partitions. The reason I do both is that for a novice user, TrueImage is easier to use, but I know the Linux dd image is able to put back exactly how something was laid out, sector b
Re:HP Does this ... (Score:4, Funny)
I hope you were going for irony there.
"Your" an idiot (Score:2)
(and I believe the preferred
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Do they still run hot? I once had a HP laptop (AMD Turion X2, 64-bit Vista), and if I routed the exhaust vent into a shoebox, I could probably bake bread or reheat my pizza. Then I installed a BIOS upgrade and those overheating problems went away. It still ran ridiculously hot, but not as bad as before the upgrade.
I'm on a Dell/Pentium now, and it runs much cooler and the performance is better.
Not necessarily a rip-off (Score:3, Interesting)
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Well two things (Score:3, Insightful)
1) You can remove the partition easy enough.
2) Are you hurting for disk space on a new system? Hell I just bought a laptop a couple months ago and it has 500GB of disk space in it. A *laptop* has that much. Desktops are no problem to get with 1TB or more. Are you really going to miss 10-20GB of that?
I mean I reinstalled my laptop with Win 7 Pro, instead of the included Home version, but I left the recovery partition. Why not? It isn't a problem or anything.
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1) You can remove the partition easy enough.
Yes, you can. Too easily, in fact.
Sure, if you have Windows (or whatever your favorite OS is) install media then you probably don't care about this recovery partition. It's a good way to get a little extra space on the disk.
But if you don't have install media and you remove the partition? Now you're screwed.
I mean I reinstalled my laptop with Win 7 Pro, instead of the included Home version, but I left the recovery partition. Why not? It isn't a problem or anything.
The problem I have with a recovery partition isn't the space it takes up... It's the fact that it lives on my HDD.
If I get a nasty virus that starts eating my PC, it can get at that recovery partitio
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Well, if you don't plan on actually using the recovery disk (if you, say, have a copy of the Windows install DVD, and know how to install your own drivers) then you can just get rid of the partition.
I still burn a recovery disk from the machine, just to be safe, but then promptly wipe the whole drive clean with a new Windows install.
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Windows computers I look after either have remote deployment or I already have appropriate physical media (I've got drawers stuffed full of the shiny holographic XPsp2 CDs.) (Although I admit that route loses the install time OEM tailored drivers)
As for Linux machines, the distros are available everywhere - even if I didn't have a live flashdrive.
Just happened to me (Score:2)
Infuriating (Score:3, Insightful)
Actually, perhaps the Linux zealot faction should welcome the "no OS discs" trend. Faced with a machine where you have had to replace the HDD, it is nowadays much easier to obtain and install Linux than to get your hands on the media from which to re-install Windows.
Usage (Score:2, Interesting)
Pfff... I never like recovery discs. Every grain of personalisation is gone since the company you bought the computer from placed their wallpapers and custom themes all over the place. Even worse, the harddrive is littered with trials of virusscanners or other advertisement software. Always had that personal drive for your music? It's gone! The last recovery disc I used also 'restored' they drive mapping replacing all partitions to make it factory default again. And there is nothing you can do about it. No
Re:Usage (Score:5, Insightful)
Personally I like what dell does with thier buisness machines. The discs they ship (at least the XP ones, I haven't tried the vista or win7 ones) are windows install CDs (not "recovery CDs") that use the normal windows installer, don't insist on wiping the hard drive, don't seem to install andy crapware and yet provided you install them on a dell they will install without any activation BS.
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I don't think it is just cost (Score:2)
Maybe not even primarily. It is an ease of use sort of thing. Remember: We are talking about the mass market here. Most people are not computer savvy. So if their system blows up, they want a simple fix. When it comes down to problems relating to the disk, most of them are going to be one of two things:
1) The installed OS got messed up somehow. A reinstall is the answer.
2) The hard disk failed. A replacement is the answer.
For #2, the company gets involved and replaces the disk, which of course comes loaded
Hard disk failure? Unlikely... (Score:3, Interesting)
no physical copy of the operating system they paid for if (or when) the hard disk fails
I know very few people who have recently reinstalled their OS due to hard drive failure. On the other hand, I know quite a few people who have had to reinstall their OS because their OS was a craptastic pile of failure that in one way or another became unusable due to non-hardware issues.
I hate having to be the one to say it... (Score:5, Insightful)
That in itself might be worth the so-called "Apple Tax".
Not only that, but (Score:4, Informative)
The discs are not "recovery discs", but full blown copies of the operating system.
Worth the tax to me.
Re:Not only that, but (Score:5, Informative)
> The discs are not "recovery discs", but full blown copies of the operating system.
>
> Worth the tax to me.
No they aren't. They are married to the particular model of Apple they came with. They're no more useful than a Sony recovery disk.
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Don't forget that a retail edition of OS X 10.6 just installs. No CD-keys. No activation. No "genuine advantage". No sudden black screens or notices that the OS may not be genuine. OS X installs, prompts for a username and then to register. OS X Server is a bit tougher, as it asks for a serial number and periodically checks for the same serial on the network, but it doesn't need to repeatedly phone home to keep its "genuine" status.
Why can't Microsoft operating systems do this? The losses they may ge
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...but every Mac I've ever bought has had install discs for the OS and any additional applications in the box. They are rarely needed, since Time Machine does a fantastic job of providing a backup that I can restore to, but they are there. That in itself might be worth the so-called "Apple Tax".
Every Dell I have ever bought has had install discs for the OS and any additional applications in the box. How do you like them "Apple Taxes"?
thats lame (Score:2)
One Of The Best Things About Being A Mac User (Score:5, Insightful)
Is that Apple gives you a real bonafide OS disc with the computer you buy.
Re:One Of The Best Things About Being A Mac User (Score:5, Insightful)
Depends, how much is your time worth? Before I bought my dad an iMac, it was 3 - 4 hours every time I visited cleaning crap off his computer and usually 6 hours around christmas every year to wipe the drive and reinstall. So probably around 15 hours a year. Since I bought him the iMac and he got over the initial how to questions in the first weeks, I've spent a grand total of 2 hours in 3 years upgrading from OS 10.5 to 10.6 on his machine last christmas.
Not having to deal with that crap when I visit, worth every penny of the apple tax.
Re:One Of The Best Things About Being A Mac User (Score:4, Informative)
Um I hate to break this to you. But that Snow leopard upgrade disk, is a a full OS install disk. There is no need to install Leopard first.
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A disk that is tied to a particular make model and revision of product is NOT a proper OS disk.
A proper OS disk is something that you can use on any Apple or Dell of your choosing.
A Snow Leopard disk is a proper OS package. A Mac recovery disk is not.
Conversely (Score:2)
They have installed a recovery disk exactly where it is needed when you have problems on the road.
Most devices are laptops. A recovery disk that is at home is of zero use to me when I'm in a hotel. How many people used to carry their recovery CDs with them everywhere they went with their laptops? How does that compare to harddisk failure in a laptop?
Better still might be to put it on a separate flash chip embedded inside the device.
Don't usually need it (Score:2)
Just about any PC repair person should have copies of all the commonly used OEM Windows install CD's, and in most cases (especially with Vista / Windows 7) the OEM key on your sticker will work just fine to install and activate Windows. The recovery CD will potentially save you 1 - 2 hours tracking down drivers, but you might spend nearly as long de-crapifying the OEM adware. I prefer to create my own backup partition and use ntfsclone to backup up the system once it is tuned to my liking and all addition
It's all about the cheddar (Score:3, Insightful)
Haven't experienced this problem (Score:2)
At least for Dell this appears to be a non-story.
[1]http://support.dell.com/support/topics/global.aspx/support/dellcare/en/backupcd_form?c=us&c
Even worse (Score:2)
Even worse, diligence isn't always sufficient. I've tried half a dozen times to burn the recovery disks from my Lenovo laptop. It always has an error during the process and doesn't finish. Out of fear of not being able to get the original OS back on when I wanted to try Linux on that laptop (I use Ubuntu as my desktop OS) I literally pulled out the factory hard drive and put in a new hard drive to run Linux on, as if the factory drive was wiped I had no good path back to the original setup.
I wouldn't eve
how many actually want them? (Score:2)
When recover
Spend Money to Save Money (Score:2)
We're trying to de-bloat.
I contrast this with big companies I work for/with. With hundreds or thousands of
It gets worse (Score:5, Informative)
I recently bought an ASUS netbook which not only came with no recovery discs, but no utility to create recovery media (either optical or USB). If the hard disk dies or the recovery partition is corrupted (e.g. by a failed test restore of your self-created drive image), there's no way to restore the system to its factory state yourself. This has been raised in the ASUS forums [asus.com] and their response is sorry, but you have to return the system to them if you need it restored. Remarkably, people who noted this issue in Amazon.com reviews had their criticism thumbed-down, and ridiculed by "most helpful" reviews containing the narrowminded suggestion that recovery media is unecessary because you can "simply restore from the hard disk!".
Operating System (Score:3, Interesting)
``vendors instead take the cheaper option of installing recovery software on a hard disk partition, leaving the buyer with no physical copy of the operating system they paid for''
I don't know if this is still the case, but the last time I took a look at this recovery software, there wasn't any way to install the operating system I paid for, either. This was several years ago, and the recovery software came on a separate CD. However, when run, this would actually overwrite your harddisk with some image which did not match the installation as shipped, nor matched an actual OS install - where you can, for example, use separate partitions for the OS and your data.
Failing disks are a problem, but these sorts of recovery software add a new and unnecessary problem: if, for whatever reason, you need to recover your OS, they will also wipe out all your data and installed applications. That's not recovery, that's destruction! Of course, I know about partitioning tools that can split partitions while keeping the data, and I back up my data, so I can work around the breakage, but it's still annoying.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Just like taking the car to the dealer for serv
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
My el cheapo Acer laptop was set up this way. The pre-installed software had a utility that creates a recovery disk, which I did almost immediately after buying the machine, then I threw the (2) disks into a safe. Problem was, it never really asked me to do it. I just stumbled on the utility.
I don't really see anything wrong with the practice personally, but the manufacturers should be much more forceful about telling people to burn recovery disks. There shoul
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
> - I can't make Flash work on Ubuntu, even though I've tried numerous times. It keeps saying something about, "Not enough permission."
Then you aren't really trying. You aren't actually sincerely trying to make it work. You're just trying to make it fail. You just want something to whine about. You're just a troll.
It doesn't get any easier than a vendor repository managed package.