Rudi452 wrote: ↑Thu Jan 21, 2021 4:23 pm
Thx, this T6 was running 10H2 before (did so rather well) and I saved the driver via pnputil prior to using it on a project. Now after the project I would simply like to reset it to the known clean status before all the strange drivers were tested.
I wish I could better help with using that backup you saved. Being so used to saving and restoring system images since the option became available with Vista, I've never tried the normal backup.
With this said, if you want to start fresh, as in like it would be when you bought the unit, but with 20H2 rather than whatever it came with, I would perform the clean install using the USB installation media you create with the Media Creation Tool. In the most basic terms, you boot to that USB media, choose a Custom install, delete the existing partitions, then allow the Windows installation itself to create the new partitions for you. This way you don't have to mess with creating them, which can be a bit of a pain. On the screen where it asks for a product key, you'd click "I don't have a product key", or whatever it says, as the product key for your T6 is embedded in the BIOS and will automatically be used. Then, after installation and initial Windows setup, you could reinstall the drivers from those you saved.
When booting to the USB installation media, if it gives you a UEFI version to boot to, I would choose that one rather than the non UEFI version to boot to. They'll look nearly the same in the boot options, but one will have UEFI in front of it.
The following gives a good description of how to perform a clean install. Scroll about halfway down the page and start with "How to create USB for clean install of Windows 10". Right after that is the Rufus method for creating installation media, but I'd skip that, as the Media Creation Tool method works perfectly. After that is the explanation for performing the actual install...
https://www.windowscentral.com/how-do-c ... windows-10
I've never used the "Reset" feature built into Windows, so I can't really give advice with that, though you can certainly try that if you like. In the end, you'll always have the above option to use if other things you try don't work or work the way you'd like them to. I've performed clean installs of Windows 10 on my PCs a number of times using the above method, and it always works very well. I don't have a T6, but I do have a T8, which shares many of the same components, but just isn't the stick type. And again, if you have any issues with reinstalling the drivers you saved, you always have those available for version 2004, which will definitely work, though a few will likely update via Windows update afterward.