Boaz Beatz wrote:
Does the g751jy have a backup on it? or do i need to create one myself if i wanted to restore windows and start over as new?
Boaz Beatz, that is the right question to ask, and I wish more people would think of it before blowing away their only recovery media - the partitions on their original boot drive.
You can use Asus Backtracker to create a bootable USB 3.0 16GB flash drive to use to restore to another drive later. It should be the first thing we all do when we get a new ROG laptop. If the original boot disk gets blown away, there is no other way to restore the OS than to return it to Asus for reloading.
Loading a Microsoft Media install of Windows ends up losing/miissing functionality, varies across difference models - it's fun to experiment, but keep the original install available to load before sending back to Asus for support - they will ask you to do that before you RMA it, to verify the failure also happens on the Asus OS build before RMA is approved.
You can also use power off, power up, tap F9 - to get the recovery refresh/reset options to refresh Windows to defaults or reset to out of the box install - blowing away the current partitions on all drives in the laptop.
Be careful. When creating the Asus Backtracker flash recovery drive, disconnect any other USB devices as they might be erased.
Before booting on the Asus Backtracker USB 3.0 16GB flash recovery drive, pull out any other internal drives - like the original boot drive - as the first thing the restore does is to re-partition all the drives it finds. If the restore fails - you would have blown away the original recovery partition and wouldn't be able to try to create another flash drive. RMA back to Asus.
Sometimes Asus Backtracker will say it created a recovery drive successfully, only to fail on the restore. Make sure you do a test restore if you don't intend to use it right away - put in another drive - not your original boot drive - and test the restore. If you are going to use the recovery flash drive for a restore to a new SSD/HDD right away, that will be your test
🙂2.5" drives are cheap, the 1TB boot drive that comes with the Asus can be purchased for $50, I recommend putting it on the shelf to use later if you need to send the laptop in to Asus for service.
If you want to clone the original OS, along with your new installs / configurations, I use Macrium Reflect. It let me clone down in size from the 1TB to 256GB/512GB SSD. It preserves the GPT/UEFI on the original boot drive, so you can clone to a new SSD, swap it in the old HDD position, and boot up without BIOS changes.
Macrium Reflect Free
http://www.macrium.com/reflectfree.aspxAsus splits all drives into at least 2 partitions, and the boot drive gets carved up into two mounted partitions and several recovery / system partitions.
On the clone or restored new SSD you can delete the partitions and combine into 1 mounted partition for C, and the 2nd Bay drive can be combined to put all the space into 1 mounted partition.
You need to use admin command line diskpart, and delete override to delete the protected OEM partitions. Here is a post with examples:
Anyone knows how to merge C & D disk/drive into one?
http://rog.asus.com/forum/showthread.php?51245-Anyone-knows-how-to-merge-C-amp-D-disk-drive-into-one...Have fun
🙂
