Windows 10: What is the best way to completely wipe and reinstall windows?

My computer has been crashing randomly, doesn't use solid state drive and will use a ton of RAM to operate. Need to uninstall and relinstall windows. Have tried all other recovery options and Dell tells me that I need to do a full reset. What is the fastest way to do this? I have already backed everything up I need to.

:)

 

Windows Updated(16299.309).KB4088776 Restart is required to complete.

Hi dalchina. Good news, I followed your suggestion and reinstalled the update and now it appears as "installed correctly" *Biggrin Maybe it was not necessary to run the Windows Update Troubleshooter or maybe if necessary. But using it I do not think it could have worsened something. The installation was very fast, unlike the first time it showed step 1 and step 2 completed.

Thanks for the suggestions and for the time to respond Best regards.


And thanks for the tip of that program, I'll have it on my list.

 

Most painless way to reinstall windows 10?

It depends on the junk accumulated honestly, but there are various methods. You can always remove programs, delete download folder, media locations, etc. As some have suggested, keeping some items on a separate internal storage drive is an option as well. Depends on what you have, what your budget is and how you want to handle your system and data.

The method @RejZoR suggests is sound and a method I've used dozens if not hundreds of time with great success in the field. In many cases though the goal is to keep user data intact, and to repair the OS. In place upgrade as it is called is also only doable in that method if you can boot to desktop, if you can't, it is time for some more advanced options or a format & reinstall.

With Windows 8 and 10 there are refresh and reset options that can be leveraged as well. Hold Shift and click Restart to reboot your system, this will get you into the advanced boot menu, which you'll need to choose advanced options (I forget ATM what it is called) and choose one of a couple items, refresh or reset.

Refresh is essentially In Place Upgrade but a little more aggressive as it wipes the Windows Apps and you may need to reinstall programs. Reset is like an OS reinstall, wipes user data, wipes profiles, registry, performs a install from the system image. Often times I'll do this and bypass using a USB key on a system. Though there are instances where these options will not work if a system has a level of corruption that has not been repaired/resolved. Check the OS Repair link in my sig for more info if ya need.

*Toast :toast:

 

reinstall after upgrade

I have a Surface Pro that originally had Windows 8.1 Pro. I have installed the free Windows 10 upgrade, but I now want to reinstall it. I want to completely wipe my hard drive and install Windows 10. I know this can be done, but I need a list of steps to
get everything necessary to reinstall Windows 10 (including exporting settings & preferences) and how to wipe my hard drive. Are there any good places to get a good detailed list of steps to do these things? Thanks.