Cleaning out computer and starting over – can I use recovery disks from a different computer?

I am very much interested in cleaning up a hard drive on a computer which we seldom use because of all the pop ups and annoying slowness of the operating system. I don't know where the original disks are to that computer, but have a recovery CD for another computer will same windows version. Though it may not be completely proper, do you think I could use those CD's to fix the hard drive of the former computer?

Thanks.

Nope, that won't work unless the borrowed disc is for a computer exactly like yours (same model). You can borrow a stand alone Windows XP CD and install that but it's considered illegal and Microsoft could notice you're abusing their licensing fine print. If your buddy's computer is from the same company that made your PC (say Dell) and he has an OEM disc then it could work. Still that would also be illegal.

This entry was posted on Friday, June 12th, 2009 at 11:35 am and is filed under computer recovery. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

One Response to “Cleaning out computer and starting over – can I use recovery disks from a different computer?”

GmanDO on June 12th, 2009 at 4:41 pm

Nope, that won't work unless the borrowed disc is for a computer exactly like yours (same model). You can borrow a stand alone Windows XP CD and install that but it's considered illegal and Microsoft could notice you're abusing their licensing fine print. If your buddy's computer is from the same company that made your PC (say Dell) and he has an OEM disc then it could work. Still that would also be illegal.
References :

Valuable Data Recovery