I have Sony Vaio Vista with the recovery disks that only work with OEM license and won't work with a different hard drive . Is there any way the recovery disks can be edited to work with any hard drive?
This is something new that has not been heard never before. I'm also interested to know, how can recovery disk be related to one hard disk/hard drive only.
I don't know how it is achieved. These are recovery disks with an install and software from one computer, they return the computer to the way it left the factory. They are not just windows only disk I wondered if there is a file on the hard drive that came with it that is also in the BIOS. If so how to get that file and put it on the hard drive .
Vista support will end this April (a waste of any effort for just a couple months) so why not install Windows 7 and use the DAZ loader to activate?
Is there anything pre-existing on this drive? like another operating system? Zero out/wipe the drive and try that, also some manufactures only make a recovery disk to access the recovery partition on the original drive, which is bad because if the drive fails, so does the recovery partition
Spoiler Nothing on the drive except windows. using the recovery would wipe windows and return to factory instalation That is what it is. i am curious if it can be circumvented and get the disks to work on a new drive. The manufacturers say it has to go to a repair centre for this. i am notv going there because I only want to know how it works.
As Joe C already mentioned, it's the question what the Recovery media actually contains. Did you check Disk Management for hidden Recovery Partitions?
Unfortunately OEMs don't care that much about customer wishes . As Joe C already mentioned; some vendors create a recovery partition, which contains an WIM file or several SWFs (splitted WIM). To avoid tampering by curious users without enough knowledge, they tend to hide that partition, so it only shows up in disk management, with usually no drive letter asigned .
Can it be that the manufacturer meant to say the OEM activation wouldn't work when the system disk is exchanged with a non supported one (as in only working with official oem replacement parts)?
CONLUSION (OP COULD CONSIDER): #1. The locked Vista Recovery is a dead horse either way, and doesn't even need anymore bullets. Best would be to image all partitions with Acronis or similiar and keep them together with the Recovery disk. So it can still be restored to the factory state. #2. Get Win 7 onwards from legit source and learn how to create a recovery partition with Windows and all set to your liking with the link Flipp3r offered above.
Spoiler Don't know. What they said is a new "HDD will not recognize the recovery discs as they only work with OEM license." I am only intestested in seeing if this can be changed out of curiosity. Power iso will not make an ISO out of the recovery disk. Can they be protected from copying?
This is just an exercise. I am not bothered about the computer. Just curious about the issue and if it can be got around
Check, i understand the curiosity and only wanted to offer a different Point of View. You're trying to reverse processes but lack the basics to do so propperly. For that reason i recommended to backup all for later re-usage. Then learn more about the process by creating similiar setup yourself. From what i know the disk restriction is normally done via BIOS/UEFI whitelisting. Even more stuff to explore.