you had a Hidden Partition on the Hard Drive that you Can not see, Only the Reinstall software can see

The way it works is the Manufacture puts a Extra boot option in the Bios of the motherboard or on the Boot sector on the hard drive so that when you turn the PC on it gives you the option to hit F12 or something like that
They do not have a copy of the OS on the Motherboard, There is not Such thing

Also that way they can let you burn your own copy in windows is that the hidden partition on the hard drive has some software built in the the Stock Image that lets windows burn the OS reinstalled Data to a CD and lets you do it form that.

My dell had the same thing, But i change to a bigger hard drive and it now doesn't have that partition. But i used the Dell Reinstall disk (witch i LOVE cuz its Just the Dell XP OS nothing Else ) and install in onto the new hard drive just like installing XP on any other pc.

You can copy any disk, if ya know how...

[quote="bandit"]There is (EEPROM), but it'* not used much anymore due to things like Live Update and Mad changing their OS every few minutes.

It does sound like the original author of this thread is using an update CD, whihc is a crappy thing ofr the manufacturer to call a Restore Disk...

However, I have wiped the restore partition off of both my Dell Desktop (I don't even remember if I ever had the original hard drive for that system) and my IBM Thinpad. Both systems are currently running flawlessly.

If at all possible, go to the manufacturer'* web site (I can't remember the make/model being stated yet) and see what they have for downloadable recovery tools.

MOS
The EEPROM in your computer is the Bios/cmos & settings. For now at least.; they have been working on doing away with it in the newer architecures.

what happened to good ol FDISK to set or delete partitions???

well when i got my Sony i called and got the disks from them for $17 and it was the best money i spent had all the software and a copy of media center on it

Not to start a fight over it, but I have gotten my hands on a few motherboards (I don't remember the brands) in the past that had a recovery EEPROM. Like I said, though, it was a neat idea that didn't last due to easily/frequently updated OS'*. My guess is they were intended for business use, though

The recovery eeprom is to basically return to factory settings when your primary eeprom has been corrupted. This is mainly a feature for overclockers who might tweek themselves into an unbootable configuration. In the old days you made changes with jumpers and they were easy to undo; but nowerdays if you can't bootup, you can't change bios settings either.

You could also corrupt your bios if you lost power while flashing a new bios into the eeprom.

Most people have never had the pleasure of trying to 'fix' a corrupt eeprom. Those that have get the dual eeprom boards

Or if you have Dual BIOS'* , its even nicer

But back on Topic.

So is Matt all set or do we need to send him something :?: :?

he'* all set

Update
New Hardrive works great, XP works great.
My plan was to hook up my old HD and set it as a slave, so I can still view and access all the files on it..
I hooked it up, that drive pops up, it still works, everything is there, i can view alot of the files, except for my own person file
Documents and setings/Matt
I click on it, it says Access is denied to Folder
I had a password set on my old computer for all my personal stuff..how do I fix this???
It isnt asking me for a password...