How to reset entire PC to factory?

[nerdynath97]

I was thinking how someone would reset all the hardware. I was thinking the following would work:

 

DDU (Display Driver Uninstaller);

Turn off PC then clear CMOS (since my mobo has clear cmos button)
Turn on PC and fresh install windows with windows media tool on USB (Reformat drive in the process I have an NVME SSD.)

 

Would there be anything else I have missed and where would it be done? Do you have a better method to completely factory reset the entire system?

[Crunchy Dragon]

That's really all you need to do.

 

GPU overclocks are saved in software, RAM and CPU overclocks are saved in BIOS(which you clear when resetting CMOS).

[nerdynath97]

2 minutes ago, Crunchy Dragon said:

That's really all you need to do.

 

GPU overclocks are saved in software, RAM and CPU overclocks are saved in BIOS(which you clear when resetting CMOS).

I thought so, thank you

[Agall]

48 minutes ago, nerdynath97 said:

I was thinking how someone would reset all the hardware. I was thinking the following would work:

 

DDU (Display Driver Uninstaller);

Turn off PC then clear CMOS (since my mobo has clear cmos button)
Turn on PC and fresh install windows with windows media tool on USB (Reformat drive in the process I have an NVME SSD.)

 

Would there be anything else I have missed and where would it be done? Do you have a better method to completely factory reset the entire system?

If you don't want to have to reinstall important drivers, doing a 'Reset this PC' in Windows will uninstall any unnecessary software. If you're worried about malware, I'd just go for full scorched earth with an installation media.

 

Technically you can't full reset a PC since the EEPROM that stores UEFI/vBIOS/BIOS for various components doesn't clear out and can technically have malware imbedded, but that's spooky stuff no one wants to talk about. 

 

Clearing CMOS will just default back to the base EEPROM UEFI/BIOS settings. Technically you dont modify the UEFI/BIOS when you make changes, you're just overriding the settings with what's stored in CMOS, which is volatile memory comparably. Once it loses power when clearing it, removing the CMOS battery and power, or updating the UEFI/BIOS those changes are gone.

[dilpickle]

DDU is pointless if you are doing a clean install.

[nerdynath97]

22 minutes ago, dilpickle said:

DDU is pointless if you are doing a clean install.

I dont think this is true as recently I had the internal management error and did a reinstall as a last resort and the issue persisted however DDU solved the issue.

[adm0n]

If you are super scared about anyone ever recreating data of your old install, you could also format your drive thoroughly. While doing a windows install, only a quick format is done (which basically just says, this drive is now empty, without actually deleting/overwriting anything).

 

But in almost all cases, this is pointless and will just waste time and resources

[nerdynath97]

32 minutes ago, Agall said:

If you don't want to have to reinstall important drivers, doing a 'Reset this PC' in Windows will uninstall any unnecessary software. If you're worried about malware, I'd just go for full scorched earth with an installation media.

 

Technically you can't full reset a PC since the EEPROM that stores UEFI/vBIOS/BIOS for various components doesn't clear out and can technically have malware imbedded, but that's spooky stuff no one wants to talk about. 

 

Clearing CMOS will just default back to the base EEPROM UEFI/BIOS settings. Technically you dont modify the UEFI/BIOS when you make changes, you're just overriding the settings with what's stored in CMOS, which is volatile memory comparably. Once it loses power when clearing it, removing the CMOS battery and power, or updating the UEFI/BIOS those changes are gone.

Is there a way to reset the EEPROM? 

[nerdynath97]

1 minute ago, adm0n said:

If you are super scared about anyone ever recreating data of your old install, you could also format your drive thoroughly. While doing a windows install, only a quick format is done (which basically just says, this drive is now empty, without actually deleting/overwriting anything).

 

But in almost all cases, this is pointless and will just waste time and resources

How is this done?

[adm0n]

Just now, nerdynath97 said:

How is this done?

If you can connect the SSD to a second PC, you can just do a real format in windows (just uncheck the quick format option). Otherwise a live USB stick works well.

 

4 minutes ago, nerdynath97 said:

I dont think this is true as recently I had the internal management error and did a reinstall as a last resort and the issue persisted however DDU solved the issue.

But the PC was perfectly restored to factory conditions at that point. Something can go wrong while reinstalling something. But no drivers stay around on the PC if you properly reinstall everything.

[TetraSky]

11 minutes ago, nerdynath97 said:

I dont think this is true as recently I had the internal management error and did a reinstall as a last resort and the issue persisted however DDU solved the issue.

Did you truly format the drive before reinstalling or did you basically "reset" your PC through windows?

 

What you're Describing, would only happen if you didn't actually Delete the windows partition before reinstalling windows, like through windows's built-in "reset". Which is utter trash if you're having any sort of driver issue.

[Agall]

14 minutes ago, nerdynath97 said:

Is there a way to reset the EEPROM? 

There's no personal data stored in EEPROM. If your intent is to clean a device before selling it, simply reinstalling Windows or just not selling it with the NVME drive is a solution. If you're selling it to someone who wants Windows already installed, then just reinstall using the 'advanced/custom' option and manually delete then select the unallocated volume.

 

Technically to clean a drive fully, the recommendation has been 7 passes, but its really unnecessary. Someone willing to do advanced data recovery on a drive they bought online to steal someone's data isn't targeting normal people. If you are worried about that, you could just enable bitlocker and fully encrypt the drive, then do the advanced/custom Windows reinstall from an installation media.

 

If you're just doing troubleshooting and you think its a software issue, the 'advanced/custom' reinstall of Windows from a newly created installation media is the best.

 

Download Windows 10 (microsoft.com)

"Create Windows 10 installation media", and follow the prompts accordingly.

[Speedbird]

3 minutes ago, Agall said:

There's no personal data stored in EEPROM. If your intent is to clean a device before selling it, simply reinstalling Windows or just not selling it with the NVME drive is a solution. If you're selling it to someone who wants Windows already installed, then just reinstall using the 'advanced/custom' option and manually delete then select the unallocated volume.

 

Technically to clean a drive fully, the recommendation has been 7 passes, but its really unnecessary. Someone willing to do advanced data recovery on a drive they bought online to steal someone's data isn't targeting normal people. If you are worried about that, you could just enable bitlocker and fully encrypt the drive, then do the advanced/custom Windows reinstall from an installation media.

 

If you're just doing troubleshooting and you think its a software issue, the 'advanced/custom' reinstall of Windows from a newly created installation media is the best.

 

Download Windows 10 (microsoft.com)

"Create Windows 10 installation media", and follow the prompts accordingly.

Do not overwrite an SSD, definitely not 7 times! It will heavily damage the drive. Use the built in secure erase command instead.

[Agall]

1 minute ago, Speedbird said:

Do not overwrite an SSD, definitely not 7 times! It will heavily damage the drive. Use the built in secure erase command instead.

I agree, I only ever do this to drives I'm about to mechanically destroy, its also why I don't sell drives if I'm worried someone's going to do data recovery to it.

 

I imagine enabling bitlocker before reinstalling will prevent anyone from seeing usable data if you're going to sell a whole system. Then you're just formatting the drive in the installation media and destroying that encrypted partition. Noting this is only applicable to someone looking to 'reset entire pc to factory' for the purposes of selling it.

[dilpickle]

1 hour ago, nerdynath97 said:

I dont think this is true as recently I had the internal management error and did a reinstall as a last resort and the issue persisted however DDU solved the issue.

Then you didn't do a clean install.

[Brooksie359]

30 minutes ago, dilpickle said:

Then you didn't do a clean install.

It could also be the case that windows installed drivers automatically and then they DDU and installed the latest drivers and it fixed the issues. That being said you didn't really have to use ddu as just updating the drivers likely would have done the trick. 

[CerealExperimentsLain]

1 hour ago, nerdynath97 said:

I dont think this is true as recently I had the internal management error and did a reinstall as a last resort and the issue persisted however DDU solved the issue.

Yes, it's absolutely true.

 

You are formatting the drive before reinstalling the OS.  That means it's gone, everything is gone, every setting, driver, and bit of data on the drive is gone.  You can write 'EL BARTO WAS HERE' in the registry before formatting and it's meaningless, because it'll all be gone once you format it.