Surface Pro 3 Restore

[LoneNinja]

Hi, haven't posted on here in a long time but hoping someone would be kind enough to help me out.

I've got a Surface Pro 3, and it was great until a few weeks ago, now it is all bugged out and the type cover only works about 25% of the time, the drivers keep deleting themselves. I'm trying to put a fresh install of windows on here and for the life of me can't figure it out. It's like Microsoft made it impossible. When I try to go into settings and reset this PC, it says "Could no find the recovery environment"

I've created a recovery flash drive, but can't get it to do anything either. If Microsoft/industry is going to take away our disk drives and put windows onto a tablet, are they not going to give us a way to reset the device like Android/iOS. Are we expected to bring it into a repair shop? I've been building computers for over 10 years and want to smash this thing to bits as it's become a total POS and I can't even reset it.

Maybe I just need to buy a new copy of windows and a USB DVD drive....

Thanks in advance to any help I get here. I'm using Win 10 by the way.

 

[MSCoder610]

I don't have a Surface, but I do have other Windows tablets, and I also had difficulties with Reset My PC after upgrading Windows.

If you've already upgraded to Windows 10, you should be able to use this tool to create install media, so you can do a fresh install:
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10
You can use a USB stick for the install media, you shouldn't need to get a USB DVD drive.

Also, just to be safe, before upgrading / resetting, make sure you have your Windows serial / key, you can find it with a tool like this:
http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/product_cd_key_viewer.html

Once you've upgraded to Windows 10, that tool should be able to find a valid Windows 10 serial, that you can use after a fresh install if it prompts you for a serial.

 

[postmortemIA]

Does it boot from USB flash drive with UEFI boot? If so you can make USB bootable image of Windows 10 and reinstall.

 

[quikah]

I've created a recovery flash drive, but can't get it to do anything either.

What does it do?

1. Power off
2. Insert drive
3. Hold Volume Down
4. Power On
5. Release Volume Down when Surface logo appears

 

[LoneNinja]

What does it do?

1. Power off
2. Insert drive
3. Hold Volume Down
4. Power On
5. Release Volume Down when Surface logo appears

Starts up normally, doesn't recognize I have anything on the flash drive.

I can get to a blue screen that shows continue to windows 10, turn off PC, use a device, troubleshoot. The majority of the options I see in videos I'm watching on youtube are simply not there.

I've tried creating a recovery from my surface, and I've downloaded the files from microsoft, can't get either to do anything.

 

[postmortemIA]

Type advanced startup into cortana. It will let you reboot with USB boot. make sure USB disk suppprts UEFI boot.

 

[LoneNinja]

I don't have a Surface, but I do have other Windows tablets, and I also had difficulties with Reset My PC after upgrading Windows.

If you've already upgraded to Windows 10, you should be able to use this tool to create install media, so you can do a fresh install:
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10
You can use a USB stick for the install media, you shouldn't need to get a USB DVD drive.

Also, just to be safe, before upgrading / resetting, make sure you have your Windows serial / key, you can find it with a tool like this:
http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/product_cd_key_viewer.html

Once you've upgraded to Windows 10, that tool should be able to find a valid Windows 10 serial, that you can use after a fresh install if it prompts you for a serial.

I was able to follow this first link and directly install a fresh copy of Win 10 without needing to use a flash drive.

What a pain, but it's great to have a fresh copy of Windows and my type cover is working correctly again.


Thank you everyone that responded to my thread.