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How to Reformat and Clean Install Corsair One


Waterman

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The Corsair ONE comes with Windows 10 recovery partition on the boot drive.

 

IIRC, as the system boots up hit F8. Select Troubleshooting. Then Reset System.

 

It should reinstall the OS from the recovery partition on the original Corsair ONE boot drive. And it'll give you the option to keep your files (just reinstall the OS without reformatting) or erase the drive and install clean.

 

Also, as a precaution in case you accidentally delete the recovery partition or have to change out the boot drive, always use Windows own method to create a recovery disk or usb thumbdrive.

 

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4026852/windows-create-a-recovery-drive

 

https://www.pcworld.com/article/3140449/windows/everything-you-need-to-know-about-windows-10-recovery-drives.html

 

The Windows 10 Home "key" is built into the BIOS, so if you install a clean copy of Windows 10 Home, it will pick up the Windows 10 Home Key automatically.

 

If you use a different version of Windows...for example Windows 10 Pro, then the Key won't apply and you'll have to use a new Windows Key for that version.

 

Remember to make sure the Windows Recovery disk/usb thumbdrive has enough space to back up everything. 64GB or larger should give you ample room, and they're cheap enough these days, especially if you get a slower (really not that slow) USB 2.0 drive. It'll just take longer than the slightly pricier USB 3.0 thumbdrives.

 

I use a 128GB usb thumdrive so I can occasionally save system image backups over time when Windows 10 updates to their newer versions like the Windows 10 Fall Creator's Update. This way I won't have to redownload all those updates. The default recovery partition only reinstalls the base version of Windows 10 Home :)

 

If you have the time, money, and tech know how or willingness to learn, once I get a clean system fully updated, I clone the boot drive onto a second SSD or hard drive. This way, if something happens to my boot drive, all I have to do is pop in the cloned disk and have a functional system. If I keep the cloned disk boot disk updated, it'll even have all of my programs installed as of the last update.

 

One caveat with the CORSAIR ONE about using a cloned boot drive. IF you have an M.2 drive as the boot drive, according to corsair it's not user-serviceable. (Normal SSD and hard drives are user-serviceable). So you aren't supposed to swap the M.2 drive without sending it to Corsair for servicing.

 

In that case, clone the system onto an SSD instead of another M.2 drive. You may have to learn to do some Windows boot config file editing to make the SSD boot drive work, but once you learn how it only takes moments and you get the same benefit of having a functional spare boot drive at the ready instead of having to spend time reinstalling then waiting for a ton of Windows updates, and reinstalling your programs/games...etc etc.

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The Corsair ONE comes with Windows 10 recovery partition on the boot drive.

 

IIRC, as the system boots up hit F8. Select Troubleshooting. Then Reset System.

 

It should reinstall the OS from the recovery partition on the original Corsair ONE boot disk. And it'll give you the option to keep your files (just reinstall the OS without reformatting) or erase the disk and install clean.

 

Also, as a precaution in case you accidentally delete the recovery partition or have to change out the boot drive, always use Windows own method to create a recovery disk or usb thumbdrive.

 

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4026852/windows-create-a-recovery-drive

 

https://www.pcworld.com/article/3140449/windows/everything-you-need-to-know-about-windows-10-recovery-drives.html

 

The Windows 10 Home "key" is built into the BIOS, so if you install a clean copy of Windows 10 Home, it will pick up the Windows 10 Home Key automatically.

 

If you use a different version of Windows...for example Windows 10 Pro, then the Key won't apply and you'll have to use a new Windows Key for that version.

 

Remember to make sure the Windows Recovery disk/usb thumbdrive has enough space to back up everything. 64GB or larger should give you ample room, and they're cheap enough these days, especially if you get a slower (really not that slow) USB 2.0 drive. It'll just take longer than the slightly pricier USB 3.0 thumbdrives.

 

I use a 128GB usb thumdrive so I can occasionally save system image backups over time when Windows 10 updates to their newer versions like the Windows 10 Fall Creator's Update. This way I won't have to redownload all those updates. The default recovery partition only reinstalls the base version of Windows 10 Home :)

 

If you have the time, money, and tech know how or willingness to learn, once I get a clean system fully updated, I clone the boot drive onto a second SSD or hard drive. This way, if something happens to my boot drive, all I have to do is pop in the cloned disk and have a functional system. If I keep the cloned disk boot disk updated, it'll even have all of my programs installed as of the last update.

 

One caveat with the CORSAIR ONE about using a cloned boot drive. IF you have an M.2 drive as the boot drive, according to corsair it's not user-serviceable. (Normal SSD and hard drives are user-serviceable). So you aren't supposed to swap the M.2 drive without sending it to Corsair for servicing.

 

In that case, clone the system onto an SSD instead of another M.2 drive. You may have to learn to do some Windows boot config file editing to make the SSD boot drive work, but once you learn how it only takes moments and you get the same benefit of having a functional spare boot drive at the ready instead of having to spend time reinstalling then waiting for a ton of Windows updates, and reinstalling your programs/games...etc etc.

 

Thanks for the explanation, now I feel better.

 

Question: Is it possible to download the latest Windows 10 version from Microsoft and turn it into a bootable USB and use it to reformat the Corsair One.

 

Another Question: What about those drivers and Corsair Software? Where do you get all the drivers? Is it automatically included in Windows 10? I am a Mac guy, when reformat all my macs, I never need to worry about drivers, it just come along with the latest OS.

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Thanks for the explanation, now I feel better.

 

Question: Is it possible to download the latest Windows 10 version from Microsoft and turn it into a bootable USB and use it to reformat the Corsair One.

 

Another Question: What about those drivers and Corsair Software? Where do you get all the drivers? Is it automatically included in Windows 10? I am a Mac guy, when reformat all my macs, I never need to worry about drivers, it just come along with the latest OS.

 

Yes to downloading Windows 10 from Microsoft and turning it into a bootable USB for clean installation. Yes it downloads the Fall Creator's Update. (Most recent version of Windows 10, but maybe not all the latest Windows Updates, those will still need to be downloaded after installation).

 

Here are instructions. You need to use the Microsoft Media Creation tool to get started:

[Direct Microsoft Page] https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/15088/windows-create-installation-media

[Friendlier Instructions] https://www.pcworld.com/article/3198745/windows/how-to-install-windows-10-on-a-usb-drive-with-microsofts-media-creation-tool.html

it will download your version of Windows 10 and make a bootable USB thumbdrive with the files you need to perform an install of Windows 10.

 

Also, if you want to, as an option you can download a Windows 10 .ISO image of the installation disk from Microsoft here: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10ISO and then use 3rd party tools to create an updated version which includes all the Windows Updates to that point, and turn it into a bootable USB thumbdrive version. However this path is a little more complex, and you'll have to do some googling to find your preferred 3rd party tool. I have no recommendations to make regarding this. It's not against Microsoft's terms, and it's not unlawful, just to assuage any concerns :)

 

And, you can get all your CORSAIR ONE drivers here: http://www.corsair.com/en-us/downloads use the dropdown to select CORSAIR ONE.

 

An important notice: The CORSAIR ONE requires the CORSAIR ONE version of the Corsair LINK (also known as just Link or C-Link) software to be installed and running. It handles heat management for the system, and there is a CORSAIR ONE specific version of the Link software that must be used. The "standard" Corsair Link software is NOT tuned for the CORSAIR ONE.

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