Hey guys I wanted to ask the board a question as there are so many gurus like Scott and jd who I remember did some beta-testing on Win XP. I am only now shopping around for a new computer and have been looking at Dell as well as a couple of small stores in my town. Most of the places I go to though like Dell don't give the original cd rom install disks but a "restore disk" this happened with a friend who bought a Compaq notebook. The salesman told her original install disks are no longer given for pre-installed OS as an anti-piracy measure. On another forum folks told me this was b*** so what's up here never heard of that and what does a restore disk do that an installation disk would not?

i've heard that. i would want the original xp cd. reason? happened just a couple of days ago.installed the latest nvidia drivers, somehow it messed up media player, windows update, etc. some dll was overwritten.i tried going back to a system restore point, and that didn't fix the problem.so i slammed the cd in, did a repair, and i was up and running, all the apps still worked, registry was intact. just the bad files were repaired/replaced.system restore cd, you would have had to restored the box, and then reloaded every app, and configured every app, they way you had it.next time i see my ms friends online, i'll give them that question. there maybe a way to request a cd, post sale of a new box.jd

Thanks jd keep me posted.

N/T

i'm on vacation at the moment. will check when i return