Never owned a DellInquiry

I recently bought my third Dell. This time I went for a simple E510.

It came with XP MCE 2005 installed, and I ordered the Windows MCE 2005 CD for $10

It came with .....

The Windows CD I paid the $10 for. A ResourceCD containing system drivers, Diagnostics and Utilities, and Computer documentation. A CD containing the WordPerfect Productivity Pack (that was the default least cost option for application software) An AOL Install CD

Also, the HD came preparbreastioned into three parbreastions.

1st parbreastion is a small hidden 30meg or so parbreastion that contains the Dell diagnostics. 2nd parbreastion is the main system parbreastion which contains Windows. 3rd parbreastion is also a hidden parbreastion around 4.5gig, that contains a complete 2nd parbreastion image.

If you press Ctl-F11 during boot, it will invoke a menu that will allow you to perform a system reload that uses the image stored in the 3rd parbreastion to completly resotre your system to the exact state it was in when you took it out of the box. This entire re-load takes about 5min, and you end up as I said, with a system that is just like it was when you first turned it on.

Now.........

If you notice, I did not mention getting any CD's that contain any of the misc applications that came loaded on the system like the Sonic software for burning CD's.

This means that you have two choices if you want to 'reload' your system.

A. Do the Ctl-F11 Re-load. You will end up with EVERYTHING that was on your PC when it shipped.. Note: If at all possible, I would suggest you leave this hidden 4.5gig parbreastion intact and not re-parbreastion your drive to re-gain that space. It make come in quite handy somewhere down the road.

B. Do a 'reload' yourself using the Windows CD and the Drivers CD. Leaving you with a nice clean load of Windows minus all the misc crap that Dell installs. The downside to this method is you will be left without whatever applications such as the CD-burning Sonic software (in my case).

I'm not really concerned about not getting the Sonic CD because I'll be using my own copy of Nero, but, it's still annoying that Dell did not provide by default, an 'Applications' CD with the system.

In all fairness however, I have indeed heard that if you contact Dell and ask for the CD's to re-install Sonic and other apps, they will send you one at no cost. I just haven't gotten around to asking for it just yet.