Dell Studio XPS Factory restore

Question

I have a Dell Studio XPS 1645. I want to perform a System Restore to the Factory Settings. I want a clean restore, and the software tells me that all my data will be deleted. Does this apply to ALL my data, from all partitions, or only for my windows partition?

Answer 1

I would reiterate Randolph West suggestion to make sure you have a backup (get a cheap external drive and copy to that), but I think it will only wipe your primary C: partition and not any other partitions.

But its always possible I'm wrong, hence the backup.

Answer 2

The entire primary hard drive will be wiped. If you have a second partition on the same drive, there's a very good chance it'll go.

I can't speak for secondary physical drives, so make sure you have a good backup.

Answer 3

I did a factory restore on a Dell Studio XPS 1537 yesterday and the message says clearly that it will only delete the partiotion where the OS is installed. In my example it was the C partition. If you can someway normally use your computer and know how, you can create a additional partition (D) and copy you personal data there and then do the factory restore, which should not affect the data od D

Answer 4

Check to see if you have Dell Data Safe 2.0 installed from the factory

Unlike previous versions of Dell's system protection software, Dell DataSafe Local Backup 2.0 is able to restore a Dell computer to the original factory-installed configuration without erasing personal files and data.

That being said you would be foolish if you do not Back Up prior to recovery, you never know what can go wrong.

Dell Data Safe 2.0 FAQ