Major PC failure - advice sought

[expat]

My previous thread ended happily with the apparent 100% successful recovery from flood damage: http://www.sim-outhouse.com/sohforum...-a-catastrophe

Sadly, it was not to be. The SSD most badly affected with the OS on it failed in the next 48 hours. A data recovery firm has just notified me they recovered fully my D: drive (with P3D, Orbx and most, not all FS related files - which is good) but the C: drive which had Windows Pro 7 and most other programs/program files is completely shot and unrecoverable.

Here is my plan and I am grateful for others here more expert than me commenting:

I had a C drive 250gb Samsung SSD with Windows and other programs on it (now toast), another 250gb SSD D drive with P3D, Orbx and other FS stuff - this data is fully recovered/transferable - and a Seagate 1TB HDD E drive that had My Documents, and importantly aliased P3D Addon Scenery and AI aircraft on it. This HDD appeared unaffected by the flood and was not sent for data recovery (fingers crossed it will still work and is safe from deterioration - may need to revisit that).

I plan to get two new 500gb Samsung SSD's - one to transfer the recovered D drive data onto and the other to replace the defective C drive and with which to install Windows - this time W 10 Home - and other programs.

Where I am unsure is how to install Windows on essentially a new build. My plan is to buy retail Windows 10 Home on a flash drive (about £100) and then attempt to boot from the USB stick, installing the Windows 10 OS onto the clean new C drive SSD. Where I go from then I am not sure, but at least if it works to plan I should be able to navigate the internet, download all the other core programs and eventually P3D stuff. One main doubt is how to "re-map" the C, D and E drives that together formed my well working P3D installation. I guess there will be some trial and error but the key must be to get Windows working. Also recall at least for FSX when W10 came out some hair tearing with user rights, admin privileges and general irritating impediments to running FSX but these seem to have been sorted out over the years.

Anyway, sorry to burden you with all of this. My wife and I are swamped with all the logistics of repairing our flood damaged house and moving out shortly to another place with all our undamaged furniture so probably will not be simming for a long time!

Thanks in advance for your time and comments.

expat

[dhazelgrove]

Are you only replacing the SSDs? What about the state of the motherboard and other hardware?

Dave

[wombat666]

You might need to set the W10 flash drive as the first boot in your BIOS.
It can always be reset in the BIOS to have C Drive as the primary once everything 'W10' is up and running.
Signing yourself up as 'Administrator' should allow you privileges when it comes to allocating where the assorted FS bits end up.

[Dangerous Beans]

Don't waste your money paying for Win10, although they don't advertise it you can still use your Win7 key to activate Win10. It has to be the same version though so you will get Win10 Pro.

If you have access to a working PC download the Windows 10 media creation tool from Microsoft and use it to make a bootable thumb drive, you just need a blank USB drive that's at least 8Gb.

[expat]

Don't waste your money paying for Win10, although they don't advertise it you can still use your Win7 key to activate Win10. It has to be the same version though so you will get Win10 Pro.

If you have access to a working PC download the Windows 10 media creation tool from Microsoft and use it to make a bootable thumb drive, you just need a blank USB drive that's at least 8Gb.

Thanks - I had originally thought that but then had the impression you could not do the free upgrade without having a working Win7 install - not just the Win7 key. I don't have a retail, only the OEM Win7 key. I have only a working HP laptop but I guess I could get the thumb drive, download the Win10 media creation tool onto it, boot my PC with the new drives installing the new OS from the USB thumb drive - and then activate the new Win10 Pro OS on my rig - with my OEM Win7 key? Is that all correct?

[Priller]

Hey Expat, yes that still works, even with OEM keys:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xk2ehSqF7po

Priller

[Dangerous Beans]

I don't know if an OEM key will work or not but if it doesn't there are definitely much cheaper alternatives than paying full retail for a Win10 key.

One example from a quick Google search
https://www.cjs-cdkeys.com/products/...AaAs4lEALw_wcB

While on the subject a couple of notes on installing Win10
While installing make sure that your PC does not have any connection to the internet, LAN or Wi-fi.
If it does it will want you to make a Microsoft Account straight away, you can do that later if you want to but best to bypass it for now while you get it up and running.

The advantage to creating a Microsoft account is that Windows will be tied to you rather than the hardware so you can freely transfer it to a new PC at a later date if you want without having to jump through hoops.
Of course one disadvantage is that Microsoft forever owns your soul

You can always install it in demo mode to begin with. There is no operational difference between activated and non activated just a few of the desktop customisation options are locked out. There's also no time limit on using it unactivated unlike previous versions of windows. there's just a small activate windows now link on the desktop to make you feel guilty.

[expat]

Just to report back I followed your advice, used the upgrade USB media tool installed Win10 and saved £100! Thanks guys. A long road ahead re-installing absolutely everything, but it feels good to be up and running!

[Dangerous Beans]

[Jafo]

Good to hear...