[EdmondJ]

Hi,

I bought a Dell Inspiron with Windows Vista, which did not have PowerPoint installed as I was anticipating, in the MS Office suite. Dell tech support responded by installing by remote control, the MS Office 'Blue Edition' but afterwards various Windows icons began to crash. I Googled on MS Office Blue Edition which revealed it was a pirate version (e.g. a forum here) even though Dell said it had installed it on many customers' PCs. So I uninstalled it and tried to do a Windows restore but the PC would not perform the Windows restore. I did a re-set to factory settings but then it would not initially recognise my modem. Eventually, after a series of re-sets, the PC connected to the internet.

A friend has warned me, the software may have corrupted my Registry. I downloaded a trial of Registry Mechanic which cited 144 problems, 13 of which the trial resolved but a long list of 'high priority' items remains. I am a bit wary, these Registry cleaners may panic you into assuming your Registry has serious problems, in order to buy their software. Anyway, I am wondering whether to buy one of these or put my foot down with Dell and insist the PC is replaced. Any thoughts?

There has also been a minor intermittent hardware problem: on putting the PC to sleep, it may not settle down with its blue light flashing (as it should), the PC becomes locked with no key able to make it do anything; I have to pull out the electric cable and re-start. If this is a chronic problem then again I am thinking of rejecting the PC and insisting on a replacement.

I now appreciate what some refer to as 'Dell Hell' but in fairness I also own a ten year-old Dell Dimension that has proved a fine workhorse - unlike an expensive IBM Thinkpad that crashed and was unrepairable as soon as its 3-year warranty expired. So overall I feel inclined to persist with Dell.

[RootbeaR]

Do a full destructive recovery. (This will delete everything, including data.)
It reformats, recreates partitions then installs.

If not happy then, I would want a new puter.

Why do you need Powerpoint?
If it is just to look at files, MS has a free Powerpoint veiwer.

If you want a program, take a look at Open office Impress.

[EdmondJ]

I am unsure how to do that, in Windows Vista.

Under Control Panel, the Backup and Restore Center offers the chance to restore Windows to a previous setting, the 'Restore to Factory Setting' I did by booting up in Windows Safe mode. Where do you find 'Full Destructive Recovery' and what is the effective difference from 'Restore to Factory Setting'? I thought I saw the hard drive being re-formatted and partitioned when I did this. Shouldn't Windows Vista Registry revert to 'as new'?

Any thoughts on the virtues of Registry clean-up software, also for regular maintenance of the Registry under Windows Vista?

(I need Powerpoint to read presentations.)

[RootbeaR]

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/d...displaylang=en

http://www.openoffice.org/

If it reformatted and recreated partitions, then re-installed, then there is nothing wrong with your registry, as far as the third party app you mentioned is concerned.

Most people here do not recommend any "registry cleaner."

I have used CCleaner in the past and do not think there were any issues, but on the other hand, I don't think it really improved anything and I had installed and uninstalled a ton of programs, games and game demos.

I don't think I would bother to install it again. Or any other registry cleaner for that matter.