W10 Laptop Installation (Help!)

[InternetRecluse]

Hello all.

 

I've been asked by a family member to clean up their laptop's hard drive for them. There are so many viruses and useless files that booting up to Windows 10 is a huge drag and the experience after the boot isn't fantastic either. So far, i've removed the HDD from the Aspire E15 laptop and plugged it into my own computer through SATA. I was planning on backing up files like images, documents etc. on my own storage and then wiping the disk.

After this, I was goin to reinstall windows with a more unconventional method using my own PC, but i'm not experienced with Laptop OSs, and I want to know if doing this and reinstalling the drive into the laptop will work, or if I should look for another method.

Any and all advice is greatly appreciated. Thank you!

[NelizMastr]

So you obliviously connected an infected harddisk to your clean uninfected PC? Good idea!  

 

I'd just run a rescue CD like AVG offers here:

 

https://www.avg.com/download.prd-arl

 

And make sure the drive is clean of viruses before continuing. After that, sure, copy off all important files etc. and reload Windows.

[Firewrath9]

5 minutes ago, InternetRecluse said:

Hello all.

 

I've been asked by a family member to clean up their laptop's hard drive for them. There are so many viruses and useless files that booting up to Windows 10 is a huge drag and the experience after the boot isn't fantastic either. So far, i've removed the HDD from the Aspire E15 laptop and plugged it into my own computer through SATA. I was planning on backing up files like images, documents etc. on my own storage and then wiping the disk.

After this, I was goin to reinstall windows with a more unconventional method using my own PC, but i'm not experienced with Laptop OSs, and I want to know if doing this and reinstalling the drive into the laptop will work, or if I should look for another method.

Any and all advice is greatly appreciated. Thank you!

mabye use malwarebytes and do a scan, whats your unconventional method for reinstalling windows; because i think you need a new key.

[InternetRecluse]

3 minutes ago, NelizMastr said:

So you obliviously connected an infected harddisk to your clean uninfected PC? Good idea!  

 

I'd just run a rescue CD like AVG offers here:

 

https://www.avg.com/download.prd-arl

 

And make sure the drive is clean of viruses before continuing. After that, sure, copy off all important files etc. and reload Windows.

So, will installing W10 using the PC and putting the drive into the laptop work? That was my main concern. I'm not very worried about the files on the laptop, i don't think there were any serious viruses on it, and I was the last person to use it.

[NelizMastr]

2 minutes ago, InternetRecluse said:

So, will installing W10 using the PC and putting the drive into the laptop work? That was my main concern. I'm not very worried about the files on the laptop, i don't think there were any serious viruses on it, and I was the last person to use it.

The license that's built into the laptop for Windows won't activate on another PC. You need to do the installation on the laptop.

[Br3tt96]

11 minutes ago, Firewrath9 said:

mabye use malwarebytes and do a scan, whats your unconventional method for reinstalling windows; because i think you need a new key.

Couldn't he just re-use the same product key?

[InternetRecluse]

But I was planning on formatting or deleting some of the partitions on the drive. Is there one in particular that I should leave for the license to still be there? (Recovery 600MB,<Blank>300MB, Acer (E:) 914GB and Push Button Reset 15GB)

I want all of the unnecessary files gone, and an antivirus wont do that.

5 minutes ago, NelizMastr said:

The license that's built into the laptop for Windows won't activate on another PC. You need to do the installation on the laptop.

 

[InternetRecluse]

Just now, Br3tt96 said:

Couldn't he just re-use the same product key?

Where can I find this key?

[Tabs]

35 minutes ago, InternetRecluse said:

Where can I find this key?

The key is stored in the computers firmware and is used automatically during the install. 

 

Specifically, it's stored in an ACPI table in the bios called MSDM. Even if you extract the key, it won't work on another machine because it's tied to the hardware (or more specifically, the manufacturer of the hardware).

 

You can erase every partition on the drive without worrying about activation. So long as you install Windows on the same machine, it'll activate as soon as it goes online for the first time. You may wish to retain the 15GB Push Button Reset partition as this partition will also include any hardware-specific drivers the machine may need.

 

As @NelizMastr mentioned in passing, it was a terrible idea to connect a known-infected storage medium to another pc even if you were just trying to erase the drive; a better idea would have been to use a Linux live cd or a WinPE environment to backup important data on the drive without removing it from the original machine, and then wiping it during a fresh Windows 10 install.

 

Edit: Sorry, I forgot to directly answer your original post. The best idea right now is to reconnect the drive to the original pc, and download and run something like Ubuntu (or any other number of Linux live images) from a usb stick to copy files off the drive. Windows malware won't be able to run within the Linux environment, which adds a layer of protection between the infected machine and whatever machine/devices you copy files to.

 

After that, download and create a bootable windows 10 install image using Microsofts Media Creation Tool. Be sure to select the version of Windows the laptop already had. During install, when it asks you for a key, select "I don't have a key" at the bottom and it'll continue installing.

Edited July 18, 2018 by Tabs

[InternetRecluse]

15 minutes ago, Tabs said:

The key is stored in the computers firmware and is used automatically during the install. 

 

Specifically, it's stored in an ACPI table in the bios called MSDM. Even if you extract the key, it won't work on another machine because it's tied to the hardware (or more specifically, the manufacturer of the hardware).

 

You can erase every partition on the drive without worrying about activation. So long as you install Windows on the same machine, it'll activate as soon as it goes online for the first time. You may wish to retain the 15GB Push Button Reset partition as this partition will also include any hardware-specific drivers the machine may need.

 

As @NelizMastr mentioned in passing, it was a terrible idea to connect a known-infected storage medium to another pc even if you were just trying to erase the drive; a better idea would have been to use a Linux live cd or a WinPE environment to backup important data on the drive without removing it from the original machine, and then wiping it during a fresh Windows 10 install.

 

Edit: Sorry, I forgot to directly answer your original post. The best idea right now is to reconnect the drive to the original pc, and download and run something like Ubuntu (or any other number of Linux live images) from a usb stick to copy files off the drive. Windows malware won't be able to run within the Linux environment, which adds a layer of protection between the infected machine and whatever machine/devices you copy files to.

 

After that, download and create a bootable windows 10 install image using Microsofts Media Creation Tool. Be sure to select the version of Windows the laptop already had. During install, when it asks you for a key, select "I don't have a key" at the bottom and it'll continue installing.

Thanks! I realise that the hard drive thing was probably a bad idea, but I thought that as long as I dont run anything, I'd be fine.