Windows 10: How to reset pc without Windows Installation/ recovery drive.

Earlier this year in may, I reset my pc because it was experiencing problems, but now I want to do it again because those problems have returned and I would like a fresh start. Whenever I go to reset this pc, it says " Insert your Windows Installation or recovery media, and restart your PC with the media" but I dont have it. I don't know what i did last time but i dont have whatever it needs. I have a dell g5 15 5590

:)

 

Missing Recovery Environment

Hi Alan,

Here is a link containing several useful suggestions to help you recover Windows 10. Since the error message that you got tells you to insert your Windows installation or recovery media. We suggest the perform the steps listed under
Use a recovery drive to restore or reset your PC or you can also follow the steps under
Use installation media to restore or reset your PC. Please see the link below for more details:

Recovery options in Windows 10.

Regards.

 

Win10 Reset This PC/Recovery Drive fails, overwrites wrong drive!

I appreciate you are taking the time to reply, but those links aren't applicable.

I replaced the drive. I have a new NVMe drive with nothing -- no OS on it.

I want to re-install with the factory image which was created with the create recovery drive option.

I'm looking for an answer that tells me IF is possible to tell the Recovery Tool / Reset This PC, which drive to use.

I'd prefer an option that doesn't require disassembling the laptop to disconnect the HDD in order to run the recovery tool.

I suppose one possibility might be to:

1. use a set of Win10 media to create generic install on the NVMe drive,
2. wipe the HDD so there doesn't appear to be a (partial) windows install there.
3. Try the Recovery Drive/Reset This PC to see if it can restore the system disk from the recovery drive to the desired (factory) state.

 

Installing Drivers in Recovery M4 SSD

I can't seem to figure out how to install drivers so that can copy my system image to new laptop hard drive. I went as far as to install a new inactivated windows 7 onto the hard drive so I know it works, but when I point recovery at C:\Windows\system32\drivers\disk.sys, I got an error something along the lines of "not relevant to system hardware" (or something like that I forget the exact wording).

I can list the drive in diskpart, and I made sure it is not excluded for copying the image, but after 3 days of fiddling, I still can't get it to work. Where is the driver that I need for recovery to be able to install an image to the new hard drive? I checked crucial website, but they don't seem to list drivers for M4. I assume that since I was able to install a fresh inactivated Windows 7 from a startup disk that the driver I need would be somewhere in that system so maybe I'm just pointing recovery at the wrong file?