Questions About My New Acer (Recovery & CPU Temp)

I bought a HP laptop on a black Friday 3 years ago, which recently crapped out on me. At one point, I made recovery discs and installed Ubuntu, wiping the drive. I then eventually switched back to Windows 7 using the recovery discs (I teach Microsoft Office at the school I work at and I needed it on the laptop).

I got my new laptop a couple days ago. Its this one:
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/ite...

I also installed this to bring my RAM up to 8GB:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

I have two unrelated questions about all of this. First, I have a Windows 7 disc that I would like to use to take my laptop to 7 from 8, but I really would like the option to go back later. The things I have been reading about recovery on the Acers involve using a flash drive, and I have even seen on another site where you can't really use the flash drive to go back from another OS like that. Does anyone know if that is the case? Is there any way to just make recovery discs like I did on my old laptop?

The second question involves my CPU temperature. I use the Piriform programs quite a bit, Speccy included. I fired up Speccy right after I first got the laptop and installed the new RAM (Speccy recognized the RAM fine), and it was showing my CPU temp up around 98-100C. It doesn't feel that warm to the touch, and when I used another program, it showed my temp to be in the mid 40s. Has anyone seen that from Speccy before? I figured it might have something to do with the Windows 8/AMD process combo, but I don't know. I know that I tried some other programs to check my CPU temp (like Speedfan) and they wouldn't even show the CPU temperature.

Anyway, I would really appreciate some insight into all of this, and I apologize if my search-fu sucks and this has been answered before. I couldn't find anything. Thanks!