Factory Reset on Acer Aspire V5 Questions

Laptop was originally sold with Win 8 installed. Received it with Win 10 installed, but with Win 8 completely removed. That is to say I cannot rollback Win 10 to the original install. I want to do a hard reset to the factory settings.

1. Will it still reset to Win 8?

2. Will I need any installation disks / codes / passwords for the installation? I have nothing with the Acer as it was a 3rd hand gift and the Microsoft keycode label has long worn off (along with the letters on most of the keys but that is another story).

If the factory reset will not work, due to the presumed reformatting of the drive and win 10 installation, what other options do I have to reinstall Win 8?

Thanks so much.

Accepted answers

JackE

Windows activation product keycodes are now hardwired & linked to the original mainboard serial number id (SNID) & BIOS hardware, not the HDD anymore, so you shouldn't need it. You can get both the Windows keycode & SNID by opening the command prompt and entering "wmic os get serialnumber" and "wmic bios get serialnumber" respectively.

I suggest you first try to see if the hidden recovery partition is still intact with the ALT+F10 method. If you get the recovery screen you can easily cancel the process. If you don't get the screen, you might try to enter the BIOS menu by tapping the F2 key on boot and see if the D2D recovery option is enabled. If it is, then the recovery partition is probably gone and you'd have to try to order the origina ACER Win8x recovery USB stick thru the ACER store in your region https://www.shopacer.co.za/ Scroll to the bottom of the screen and either call or email with your machine's serial number id (SNID) and request the stick not the DVD. Cost should be about $50 usd.

You also have the option of making a generic Win8x installation stick for free using Microsoft's media creation tool as stated earlier. But then you'd probably also have to download and install a few device drivers from the ACER site so that all devices will work properly under the generic Win8x version. https://www.acer.com/ac/en/US/content/drivers

If it were my machine --- and if the hidden Win8x recovery partition is gone --- and if Win10 seems to be working OK --- I'd probably leave it as is and try to live with Win10, difficult as that may seem. Believe it or not, Win10's graphical user interface can be adjusted to have almost the same look, feel & operation as Win8x or better yet Win7 if you play around with Control Panel's personalization settings.

Jack E/NJ

wis

From the horse's mouth.
Worst case scenario: click "no key" option or "skip", purchase key from Ebay & then activate.

All comments

JackE

Win8 no, you must order the USB stick or DVD based on your machine's SNID. Win8.1 maybe, if the Win10 install hasn't already wiped out the hidden ACER recovery partition. If it has wiped it out, you also have to purchase the recovery media. You also have the choice of downloading the Microsoft version of Win8.1 iso for free. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows8ISO This can be converted to a bootable installation usb using rufus. You can test to see if the original Win8.1 is still on the machine by turning the power completely off. Then turning it back on again and immediately press and hold the Alt key while tapping the F10 key. You should get a recovery screen like that shown in the video below. Jack E/NJ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IFuWwuc2oH4

YummyBear

My question is - if I do get the recovery page, and I go through the steps - will I need a Win keycode for the installation? I don't want to get half way through and then discover I need an installation disk, windows registration key, or anything else I don't have because as I said this was a third hand gift. The original owner sold it to my mom who gave it to me when she bought a new laptop. It is seriously old. The touchscreen doesn't even work anymore either because it was cracked across the corner. And the keys have a paper label set stuck on them because all the letters wore off. But as a testimony to something - it still works.

If I don't get the recovery page, and it's all been corrupted, then what? This model does not have an optical drive, only USB.

Kamalika

Hi YummyBear,
If you've upgraded a PC to Windows 10 — not performed a clean install, but an upgrade — you'll have an easy option that lets you revert to the last version of Windows.But if a clean install had been done to get the windows 10 installed then you cant go back to previous windows.

However if you don't get the recovery page because its corrupted then unfortunately you will need to buy a recovery media with windows 10 or 8, which comes in the form of USB only.

JackE

Windows activation product keycodes are now hardwired & linked to the original mainboard serial number id (SNID) & BIOS hardware, not the HDD anymore, so you shouldn't need it. You can get both the Windows keycode & SNID by opening the command prompt and entering "wmic os get serialnumber" and "wmic bios get serialnumber" respectively.

I suggest you first try to see if the hidden recovery partition is still intact with the ALT+F10 method. If you get the recovery screen you can easily cancel the process. If you don't get the screen, you might try to enter the BIOS menu by tapping the F2 key on boot and see if the D2D recovery option is enabled. If it is, then the recovery partition is probably gone and you'd have to try to order the origina ACER Win8x recovery USB stick thru the ACER store in your region https://www.shopacer.co.za/ Scroll to the bottom of the screen and either call or email with your machine's serial number id (SNID) and request the stick not the DVD. Cost should be about $50 usd.

You also have the option of making a generic Win8x installation stick for free using Microsoft's media creation tool as stated earlier. But then you'd probably also have to download and install a few device drivers from the ACER site so that all devices will work properly under the generic Win8x version. https://www.acer.com/ac/en/US/content/drivers

If it were my machine --- and if the hidden Win8x recovery partition is gone --- and if Win10 seems to be working OK --- I'd probably leave it as is and try to live with Win10, difficult as that may seem. Believe it or not, Win10's graphical user interface can be adjusted to have almost the same look, feel & operation as Win8x or better yet Win7 if you play around with Control Panel's personalization settings.

Jack E/NJ

wis

From the horse's mouth.
Worst case scenario: click "no key" option or "skip", purchase key from Ebay & then activate.

YummyBear

Thanks guys I will give it a try. The issue with Win 10 is the horrible huge updates. I am on a limited data plan and they are too big. Plus they seem to have a nasty habit of doing nasty things to people's computers which I seriously can't afford. Only thing is that Win 10 LURVES its updates and gets all kinds of twitchy if you don't do them so I'm caught between a rock and a hard place. Wish I could put Win 7 on the Acer which I believe can be done, but requires a few special tweaks to make it work which a. I don't know how to do and b. doesn't sound like a good plan. I have it on my desktop. Best version of windows ever (if there is such a thing). It's stable. It works. Have not had a conflict problem yet and it's been on here for 4 years now. But hey ho Win 8 (or 8.1) isn't the worst and at least it can't be as bad as Win 10.

wis

Windows 7 is very stable (if you don't habitually rip movie DVD's). The Aero glass desktop is very easy on the eyes; unlike the flat, two dimensional tiles on 8 & 10. Navigation is simpler with 7. The clock just above the Notification Area is very handy.
If the defaults are not turned off, Windows 10 is a vacuum cleaner (Hoover if you are in the UK) of your personal data. Even when the defaults were turned off, one could not be certain that personal information was not being sent back to Microsoft in the background.
With the transition from BIOS to UEFI, it's no longer as simple as downloading the Windows 7 .iso, burn & install. The least expensive & painless way would be to purchase a refurbished Windows 7 laptop from a larger vendor like Ebay or Walmart (or its equivalent in your area). If there is an problem with it, just return it within the grace period for a full refund.
Bear in mind that end-of-life support for Windows 7 will be January 14, 2020. When that happens, return to the forum & start a new thread about conversion to Linux Mint. It's free & very stable. I've dual boot with it on my old Dell desktop when support ended for XP.

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