I have an HP laptop with Win 8.1 on it, it crashed and when it rebooted I couldn't do any updates, defender wouldn't update, and I could not install or uninstall ANYTHING. I tried to do a clean install of 8.1, no dice. Tried to do a clean install of 7, and now it says it does not recognize the OS at all. There are no recovery discs for it, as you get one download only, the new recovery media is $50 (which is crazy) I have tried EVERYTHING imaginable save for taking it out and burying it for the next ten years. Any help would be appreciated