Windows 10: How can I do a full reinstall of Windows on my laptop?

I used the Media Creation Tool, it put about 3.36GB on the flash drive, I'm assuming that's correct. I downloaded Macrium Reflect to backup the laptop before I do anything else, I attached a screenshot below. Do I just click on Actions under the C:/ Drive and select "Image this partition only"? I don't know what any of the others are that you see listed. It says it.would be 30GB, that is a lot of blank DVD I would have to use. All I have is 128GB flash drive, a 2GB and a 1GB. I had a 4GB one that was holding Win10 from the Creation Tool but it seems faulty now so I'm trying to figure out what to do. It works off and on.

Edit: Can I just put the backup image of Windows that'll I'll make from Macrium, the drivers that I'll export using your command and the Windows 10 files from the Media Creation Tool all on the same 128GB flash drive? I also literally just got my 2TB Seagate External HDD in the mail from Amazon. However, didn't know if Windows 10 has to be on a USB flash drive only or if external hard drives work as well. Or should I just put Windows 10 and the drivers on the 128GB flash drive and the backup image of Windows on the external?

 

Bump

 

If you have blank DVDs then make a Windows 10 installation DVD from the ISO file and use that. Make an image of the entire hard drive to the external hard drive, export your drivers to the external hard drive. Make a Macrium Reflect Rescue DVD. Then boot from the Windows 10 install DVD to do your clean install with.

 

Damn, I wasn't even thinking, my laptop doesn't have a DVD drive, only a slot of SD storage. Using the Media Creation Tool I put Windows 10 on the 128GB USB flash drive I have but like you said it formatted it to 32GB or so. Other than that I have the 2TB external hdd & two 16GB MicroSD cards. My other flash drivers are to small use. Any ideas or am I forced to buy another large flash drive?

Also, are you saying I need to create a Rescue backup and also an Image backup in Reflect? What is the difference?

Again, thank for the help.

 

You need both the image of your hard drive created by Macrium Reflect onto the external hard drive and a Macrium Reflect Rescue Disk created either on a USB flash drive or DVD. The Macrium rescue disk should fit on a 1 GB flash drive - and definitely on 2 GB. The image is just a backup file, and it will be 80-90% in size of the used space of your hard drive as there is not need to backup free space. You cannot boot from the backup image file. The Rescue Disk is what you would boot the computer from in order to restore the image back to the hard drive (or a new hard drive) should a catastrophic failure occur.

Most computers will not boot from MicroSD cards, so that's why you can't use them for the Rescue disk or the Windows install disk.

Flash drives are pretty cheap - you can get a 2-pack of 8 GB drives at Walmart for less than $10.

 

I finally had time to do everything. Before I go ahead and try install a vanilla copy of Win10, can you check the screenshots I took just to double check that I've covered everything and it all looks correct?

- This is the Rescue Media, I was able to fit it on a 2GB flash drive like you said, it only came out to 244MB which seems kind of low?: Imgur: The most awesome images on the Internet
- Here is the Image Backup of my current laptop on the 2TB external hdd, the image is around 21GB. I was only supposed to image the C Drive correct? It looks like there's 3 other partitions: Imgur: The most awesome images on the Internet
- I used the Media Creation Tool exe to put Windows 10 on the 128GB flash drive which was formatted to around 30GB. The Win10 img was almost 6GB: Imgur: The most awesome images on the Internet
- I did that export command that you wrote for saving my drivers, I put them in a DriversW10 folder on both the Image Backup(ext hdd) & the Media Creation(128GB flash drive). I didn't know exactly which one to put it on.

 

You should have imaged your whole disk, not just the OS partition. The first partition on your drive is where the boot files are. And I would boot from the Rescue USB to make sure it works.

 

I put the Rescue USB in along with the ext hd with the Backup Image, held down Shift & clicked on Restart. I was able go through the settings(Choose an option>Use a device>EFI USB Device). Once I clicked on EFI, Reflection started and I could also see the ext hd once Reflection opened. I just deleted that single partition and selected all 4, it's now 21.5gb. SS: https://i.imgur.com/URNzH3f.jpg

However I keep getting this error: https://i.imgur.com/7YQCvgl.jpg

I noticed when creating the Rescue disk I kept getting this popup: https://i.imgur.com/u0v0WiX.jpg

It seems it can't find that driver but I created the Rescue/PE anyways. Will that cause issues installing the others or can I simply find it from the Toshiba website if I ever need to use this Rescue disk?

If I'm all good, I now just put the Windows 10 flash drive in, instead of the Recue drive, do the shift/restart and install a fresh copy?

 

You only need that driver if you are going to back up or restore from the network. Not needed since you are using a USB hard drive. You should be good to go. You might not be able to connect to your network until you go into device manager and install the network driver from the folder you exported the drivers to, just be prepared for that.

 

Im at the "Where do you want install Windows", I see 4 partitions like I previously mentioned (system, msr(reserved), primary, recovery). Screenshot: https://i.imgur.com/PUT5bNE.jpg

Do I click on Format then hit the Next button with Primary selected ? I'm guessing I don't delete anything, lol. Or do I simply click Nect with the Primary partition selected? The Clean Install guide by Brink got me confused a little bit after step 11. I didn't know if I was to go with 12. If Installing Windows 10 without UEFI or 13. If Installing Windows 10 with UEFI.

 

Click on each partition and delete it. When you are left with one big unallocated space install Windows to that. You do not have to create new partitions, Windows install will do that for you.

 

Sorry for not getting back to you sooner, had some personal issues going on. Anyways, the install seemed to go smoothly, everything seems to be working. I just wanted to thank you again for all the help, you where very patient with me. Only issue is some PC games don't seem to be working.

Other than that I haven't ran into many issues. However, the USB drive that I put the Windows Creation Tool on is giving me some trouble. It was a 128GB drive but it seems to be stuck at 32GB now, since it was reformatted during the Creation Tool. How can I get it back to 128GB? Under Capacity it just says Unknown.

Edit: I followed this and now the USB drive wont even work. Every time I put it into my PC is asks to reformat. I clicked YES but nothing happens. Every time I insert it is just asks me to reformat again.

Screenshots:
https://i.imgur.com/yXmXqO7.png
https://i.imgur.com/r8qKul1.png

 

Install MiniTool Partition Wizard Free:
Best Free Partition Manager for Windows | MiniTool Partition Free

See what it says about the USB flash drive. See if you can right click on the icon for the drive itself in MiniTool and either initialize as MBR or convert to MBR. Then create one big NTFS primary partition on it.