Replacing Hardwrive Under Dell Warranty

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Eagleshadow

Eagleshadow

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Jun 6, 2014
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My hard drive on my Dell XPS 27 has failed the Smart Short Test so replacing the hard drive is on the horizon. Dell states that backups will be my responsibiity so I need a strategy. When the OS crashed last year :no:I spent hours on the phone getting the system back up and running. Most of that time was waiting for downloads of Win 8 and then upgrading to Win 8.1 and then all of the updates. My assumption is that Dell will install a bare hard drive and that I will have to use the USB stick to boot up and go from there. Will Dell take the old hard drive? That may be relevant if I try to recover the image.

Is their a better way? I have been reading about Disk Imaging Software as a way to go. Since I have a good image on the OEM 2 TB (~200 mb used) WD hard drive so I see no compelling reason for a fresh OS. If this is the way to go and if so what software (free I hope) will do the trick. Do any of the imaging packages allow for booting into the re install of the image or do I have to have a bare bones OS to start out with.

Thanks!:??:
 
Solution
drtweak
Dell will ship you a new drive and then give you 10 days to return it. I would ask them if they could preimage it for you (They have done this for me in the past. My company is a dell reseller so we do all the warranty work for our clients) so that you don't have to worry about reinstalling the OS. But 10 days should be enough time for you to recover data. If they give you a preimaged drive great. You can just slave the drive and copy your stuff over. If they don't there are a few imaging/cloning software that can possible do a successful clone/image. I've done it to recover data but not to clone over a whole OS yet. If they can't send you a preimaged Hard drive ask for some reinstallation media. If they don't give that to you let me...
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drtweak

drtweak

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Sep 17, 2012
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Dell will ship you a new drive and then give you 10 days to return it. I would ask them if they could preimage it for you (They have done this for me in the past. My company is a dell reseller so we do all the warranty work for our clients) so that you don't have to worry about reinstalling the OS. But 10 days should be enough time for you to recover data. If they give you a preimaged drive great. You can just slave the drive and copy your stuff over. If they don't there are a few imaging/cloning software that can possible do a successful clone/image. I've done it to recover data but not to clone over a whole OS yet. If they can't send you a preimaged Hard drive ask for some reinstallation media. If they don't give that to you let me know. I have every Dell Reinstallation Media from XP and up that i can upload and and then you can download.
 
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Eagleshadow

Eagleshadow

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Jun 6, 2014
38
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18,540


 
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drtweak

drtweak

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Sep 17, 2012
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they will give you an image of what ever the laptop came with. the thing is for the most part Win 8 is need for 8.1. I do however has a win 8.1 but it won't work on the dell. it will ask for a product key. You will have to install what came with, and then upgrade from there. Sorry but unless you go out and buy win 8.1 that is how its going to have to go down.
 
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