I'm doing this for everyone out there who has ever had to reset their Toshiba from scratch. Now, I'm actually doing my sister's computer from scratch.
I wanted to kill myself every step of the way.
If you google how to reinstall or recover a Toshiba A505, you're going to get some of the most standard steps known to man. I am the idiot who didn't immediately create recovery disks upon receipt of my baby. Luckily, my computer works fine whereas my sister's computer (which is a carbon copy a.k.a. exact model) of my own so I created the 5piece recovery disks from my own laptop.
The road was rocky.
Very rocky.
I'm no computer whiz but I'll lay out for you the most popular answers -
"
"there's an invisible image inbuilt. use it."
or the ever popular -
"2)Shut down your computer, turn it on then immediately press "f8" repeatedly then u will see the option at the bottom of the screen "press f2 to log to boot manager" press it fast or else you'll have to repeat everything again
3)Then there is the option at the top "To access advanced boot option press "f8" ,press it.
3)Under "Advanced Boot Option",highlight the option"Repair Your Computer" and press enter. 3)System recovery option menu will show up, select country and keyboard layout then press next.
4)Then there is the option to log in as a local user so you can access recovery option,enter your password.
5)After that the "System Recovery Option" will be visible,just choose what action u like
a)Start up Repair
b)System Restore
c)Windows PC Complete Restore
d)Windows Memory diagnostic tool
e)Command Prompt
f)Toshiba Recovery Wizard.
Select "Toshiba|Recovery Wizard",then select the option that says "Restore to factory default out of box state."
6)There will be a warning that all files will be lost, dont worry just go on because all the files will be rewritten just like when u first bought it. Cheers
The problem with these answers is that not a damn one worked for me. My sister's computer must be part of the Illuminati - it consulted Lucifer every step of the way. Anything I did was moot when I tried to access the in-built partition to try and fix the computer for free without disks.
So, in came the plan to create the recovery disks.
This is my revised list of steps of what to do when you need to get that shit fixed.
BE ADVISED, THIS ISH TAKES 3HOURS MINIMUM.
1) Steal or make a copy of Toshiba recovery disks. You have to do it from a computer like yours otherwise it won't do a damned thing.
2) Hit up the toshiba forums. Luckily I'm just going to copy and paste what that damned User Guide said with some edits.
3) Put the first disc in the drive, and then load up the computer. Hit F12 like a mo'fo to get to the boot screen.
4) Once that boot screen loads up, you're going to want to use your down arrow to get to cd/dvd then hit enter.
5) Now, at this point everyone magically acts like shit will happen all at once. This is a LIE. A LIE. This is why you shouldn't be alarmed that
- the screen resolution is large enough for even shortsighted grandma to read
- there's a hell of a lot of waiting time - I stared down a blank black screen for about ten minutes before that massive WARNING THE END IS NEAR sign popped up asking me if I would be okay with deleting my sister's life away.
6) Click yes to being okay about deleting your life away. The answer is almost always going to be yes, folks.
7) Another magical ten minute wait while Windows tells you it's 'loading files' or something like that. You might find it useful to pick up that book you've been meaning to get to for some light reading. I started a new kdrama - hey, whatever works for ya.
8) Now you're going to get to that magical grey screen of system recovery. It is REALLY IMPORTANT that you follow the next steps carefully.
11) RECOVERY OF FACTORY DEFAULT SOFTWARE. Then click next.
12) RECOVERY OUT OF BOX STATE. Then next.
13) Then the instructions usually say something like follow instructions bloah blah blah it'll tell you when the drive is recovered...
Also a lie from the enemy.
14) Don't worry yourself. This is going to take a long time. Another grey screen came up with something along the lines of preparing or downloading or something (can't remember, brain is numb) and it ran through three discs.
Here's my problem - I also have a windows recovery envrionemtn 64 bit disk (the fourth created) and a toshiba apps and drivers (the fifth and final one).
So when it told me it was done after 3 discs I was HELLA CONFUSED. Note that this took around 2 hours to complete just step 14.
15) Okay cool. It restarsts itself, still with that mega resolution that makes sure I'm going to have a grand headache.
16) Prepare yourself for the tricky part (note, a long drink of cold water will be helpful and maybe some Advil, since God knew I needed it...). It'll go through normal startup protocol succesfully.
Or at least it should - if it doesn't, you're royally screwed.
Anyway it'll go through the usual steps of starting itself and hit the start up screen and then the pretty blue 'log in, master' screen and it'll override that function and just enter.
17) It will open like it's done doing everything it needs to do, that is my point. THIS IS A LIE, DO NOT BELIEVE IT. It is not finished, not by a long shot.
18) It's going to go into this Configuring System screen thing. Don't be alarmed. It'll remain there for anywhere from 5 to 10 minutes, with the status box doing its thing with the glowing green meter. That's all fine and as it should be.
19) It will leave the screen and then say 'system needs to reboot to finish installing blah blah' or something like that. It will also say
Do not touch keyboard or touchpad.
And by God, you'd better listen to those instructions.
20) It's going to go into this Configuring System screen thing. Again. Don't be alarmed. It'll remain there for anywhere from 5 to 10 minutes, with the status box doing its thing with the glowing green meter. That's all fine and as it should be. Again.
21) It will leave the screen and then say 'system needs to reboot to finish installing blah blah' AGAIN or something like that. It will also say
Do not touch keyboard or touchpad.
And by God, you'd still better listen to those instructions.
22) Excercise patience and restraint. Because steps 18 through 21 are going to repeat for the NEXT HOUR. You are going to go insane. You'll think you fucked up somewhere. You'll wonder why you spent a billion hours on the first half of reinstalling and reformatting Windows for the computer. You'll briefly consider selling said laptop on eBay for parts...or holiday gifts. You might even go so far as to get up and leave the room.
Do what you got to do.
BUT DO NOT, UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, TOUCH THE GOTDAMNED KEYBOARD OR TOUCHPAD.
In fact, please leave the room to lessen the temptation.
23) I nearly touched the keypad. Nearly. But I'm a great believer in waiting to see how things play out so at the last second my itty bitty fingers veered away from my itty bitty computer.
24) I'm not kidding when I said an hour will go by, give or take a quarter of it. Next it will say 'system needs to reboot to finish installing blah blah' or something like that. It will also say
Do not touch keyboard or touchpad.
Again, do what you're told.
25) This time it's going to log in and all that good stuff and go to a different blue page - something along the lines of checking system performance. Praise Him because you are getting close to the end. It's going to remain on this page for a little over 10 minutes.
26) Read that book. Drink that water.
27) Now it's going to exit out of that blue screen and say "processing cleanup phase Susprep plugins". GOD IS GOOD. YOU ARE AT THE END.
28) The rest is the computer telling you it's preparing for first time use then it's going to walk you through setting up user and pc name and all that good stuff.
Time taken - 4.5hours
Time wasted freaking out - 4.4 hours
Time spent thanking God for the help - 10mins
You should now be all set!
