How to restore factory settings on Dell PC

louie12ie

Hi guys, my friend recently just bought a dell gx260 with Windows 2000 Professional of a friend but he needs it to restored back to the factory settings. The thing is he didnt receive a dell disk or anything with the purchase (2nd hand of course) and I have been looking online and it mentioned pressing CTRL+F11 but it didnt seem to work. Anyone with any suggestions? Deeply appreciated

CreepingDeath

When the computer is still booting, it'll say something like "Press F2 for setup".
You will probably find an option there for a factory reset.

ricman

Press those keys simultaenously when the dell logo appears,then a menu appears ,do you wish to restore to factory settings, press a certain key,ok, press enter key ,to confirm restore .This will format drive c:,all your photos,data, will be erased.when you see windows loading screen ,its too late ,

dilallio

Normally F8 on startup on a Dell

ricman

See here http://www.ehow.com/how_2184092_perform-dell-system-restore.html
try f8,but i think thats for the safe mode menu on most pcs.

louie12ie

@Creeping Death - I tried that but nothing mentions about factory setting.
@Ricman - I tried many times but it never seems to work it just loads up?? When is it best off in pressing them keys?
@Dilallio - Nah nothing mentions anything about F8, only F2 for setup and F11 for bootup setup??

ricman

try reboot press f2 ,http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080711130956AAuksxN
if its win2000 its an old pc,you can buy a dell pc on adverts ie pentium 4 cpu 1.4ghz,dvdrom drive 50 euro.
Not to be rude i reckon its waste of time fixing a computer with less than p4 cpu 1ghz ,unless you are giving it to charity .
heres the user manual, download it,
http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/opgx260/en/index.htm
download foxit reader to read the pdf manuals.
it seems to be a pentium 4 pc, so its worth fixing.

louie12ie

Haha not rude at all Ricman I would totally agree with you but its not me thats trying to use it its a friend of mine and he is not so updated with technology so any old piece of junk will do him

ricman

just reboot,hold f2, does a menu appear with restore ,or repair options?

ArtyM

For the factory restore to work the restore partition must a)exist and b) be accessible.
If this pc was ever formatted in the past the restore partition may have been deleted.
If the restore partition does exist but is not accessible to the key commands it may be damaged - this is not uncommon on old dells. Do a google for dsrfix and you will find a site that has a utility for helping fix the dell restore feature. Its a frustrating site but I have used the utility in the past and it worked on a few occasions.
You could also check the bios for any option relating to the restore.

ricman

The recovery partition is normally hidden, it would be hard to delete it unless you really wanted to do so,most users would not know it exists ,a windows install would not usually format it,it would just format drive c:\
the largest partition.

louie12ie

When I press F2 at the dell logo settings appear but nothing about system restore or anything? Has a whole list of settings from Boot Sequence, Memory Info, Power Management, System Security etc but nothing about system restore??

louie12ie

Also when I press F12 (Boot Setup) a list of 7 options appear but once again nothing about system restore? The list are 1. Normal 2. Diskette Drive 3. Hard Disk Drive C: 4. IDE CDROM Device 5. System Setup (Which brings ya back to F2) 6. IDE Drive Diagnostics 7. Boot to Utility Partition. Also I have read something online about a DSR Partition? Mentioned something if it got deleted before it wont be able to restore again? Maybe that has happened???

ArtyM

What options are available when you select boot to utility partition from the f12?

Snowbat

CTRL-F11 at the Dell logo will start Dell PC Restore by Symantec (aka Dell System Restore) if it is present but this feature appeared in mid 2004. The GX260 launched in 2002 - I doubt it has a restore partition.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQ4XK1M-JJg

goat2

i have defragmented, disc cleanup, cleaned out my mail, emptied all files off desktop and put them in my documents, i have also updated windows, to get computer up to speed, yes it has helped alot, but startup is still a bit slow, is there something i can do to speed it up,

Fluffy88

This won't help the actual start-up speed, but it will help with how fast the computer begins to respond once you get into windows.
And what this is, is remove all the unnessicary programs that load up automatically on start-up. Some of them are simple to stop like Skype(it's just a setting in the program) and then other things like Java updater or iTunesHelper need to be removed from the registry, which is a tricky job but can help the computer begin to respond a little faster.

goat2

Fluffy88 wrote: »

This won't help the actual start-up speed, but it will help with how fast the computer begins to respond once you get into windows.
And what this is, is remove all the unnessicary programs that load up automatically on start-up. Some of them are simple to stop like Skype(it's just a setting in the program) and then other things like Java updater or iTunesHelper need to be removed from the registry, which is a tricky job but can help the computer begin to respond a little faster.

thank you so much for that, yes i do have this java updater and i tunehelper also skype, is there a way of removing them

goat2

i googeled that java updater thingy, on how to stop it, i found out there and followed instructions, it brought startup a bit faster, looking for this iphone aps, as the computer i am using is one i bought one of my children about seven yrs ago and she had all her own stuff on it, so she bought a new one when she started earning and afford one, and told me i could have this back, i am glad to have it, yet this old one i use is far superior, i cleared all her pictures onto a memory stick and transferred to her computer she has now for her, along with all her other important files, which means it is cleared up, all this brought this old machine up an auful lot, but is there something else i should be looking for in startup that could be slowing it down a bit, for me i dont need all these new fandangles ,just simply browsing the net, as there is a car mad person who also use this computer, plain and simple is all we need

ricman

Go to start,control panel, add remove programs, remove skype, tunehelper, one by one,wait till it says ok, uninstall complete, then remove next program.say the drive is 60gig,there should be at least 6gig empty, a nearly full drive= slow windows.Winxp needs at least 3gig free space for temp files.Also download ccleaner,free program, run it,install it, it gets rid of old temp files ,it should free up around 200meg at least .If you dont know what a program does ,dont remove,uninstall it.Install chrome browser ,its way faster,more secure than internet explorer.google get chrome browser.Click,start ,run, type msconfig, click ok,click on startup tab, items, you can put x in a box beside,java,itunes,skype,realplayer,for example to stop em loading at bootup, repeat the process, unclick, the x box tabs, if you need em to run as before.

Fluffy88

Well then a clean windows install could be your best option. Otherwise you will spend alot of time removing programs and things from the computer, when instead you can do a clean windows install and they will all disappear. I would recommend reinstalling windows as it will always do a better job at speeding things up than doing it manually

You should have got a CD with the computer with windows on it. Very important, backup anything that's important!! Any files you want to keep, put them on a USB or a different computer. Then stick in the CD and from there it should be relatively simple to do.

jumbone

If you download a program called Magic Jellybean and use it to recover your product key, you could get a disc and use the key to reinstall windows. The PC would be quicker than after a factory restore as it the restore would include a load of unnecessary dell software and free trials etc...

If you found a SP4 disc, it would also mean you could spend less time installing updates afterwords as the Dell image could be extremely out of date.

Just be sure to copy your key for Microsoft office as well as for windows

Also, try to download all your drivers before you reinstall.

I couldn't find any SP4 discs on ebay but i found this

http://cgi.ebay.ie/200623050406

its a windows 2000 pro install cd and it comes with a key. Might be worth it for a tenner if you cant get a CD anywhere else.

You could always slipstream it yourself to make an SP4 disc using a tool like nLite

goat2

thanks to all for your great help, i used the , start, run, misconfig, it is great to learn something so simple yet so brilliant, and now the old computer is running like a young one.
reading through all posts, has helped me to be able to help myself and others who may find themselves in my position, i am so happy with this

Fluffy88

The msconfig tool is quite useful, but I would still recommend the reinstall as it will help no end, it will remove all those years of crap that's sitting around wasting space and resources and it's damn near impossible to get rid of it all manually.

If you don't want or can't reinstall, remove all those unwanted programs using Uninstall/Remove programs. And use CCleaner to clear out the computers registry.

ricman

i ran ccleaner on a friends pc, it deleted 2gig of temp files, close browser down before running it.download foxit reader ,much faster than adobe reader.,takes up less space.Run ccleaner once a month.