ImageAssist: How to download your Dell OEM Windows ISO

One more thing.  Your website is a DELL website as its address is en.commmunity.DELL.COM/xxx

So why do you tell me to go somewhere else when you represent the manufacturer?

Hi JKONTHEWEB – The team responsible for the ISO downloads have suggested the following,

Request the customer to select the country as India using the country dropdown. Pasting the direct url would not work as it would redirect user to the default country based on Geolocation.

• http://www.dell.com/support/home/in/en/indhs1

• Enter Service tag.

• Goto drivers and downloads.

• Expand the Operating system category and click on download recovery link.

• Enter the Service tag and validate Captcha.

• User will be redirected to a page providing option to download the image files using browser (This does not require DSD).

Dell System Detect tool does not work on a non-dell system and the only alternate option is to guide the user to do a browser download of the ISO files. Currently India is the only country that supports browser download and the above details support the same.

Thank you.

What a perfect solution! 

Except that its all a LIE

I followed the directions exactly.  There is NO Operating System category as you state.

Not sure that you are sorry.  And although I DID get your email, that email has NO SOLUTION whatsoever.  Your India site does not have OS images.

How is it that you don't know that?  Did you even check before you sent me your "solution"?

Sorry that you are having continued issues with your recovery ISO download

We have sent a solution direct to your email, can you please confirm if you have not received this,

If not can you please email either of our global mailboxes below based on your location-Thank you.

US_OSImaging@Dell.com

EMEA_OSImaging@Dell.com

I couldn't agree more with the frustrations of JKONTHEWEB and sedemdeh before him.   First, they have to restate the problem repeatedly, getting inane non-answers, until Dell support just ignores the question once it's made clear what the question is.

All of us, not just the occasional few, need to get the restore image because WE DON'T HAVE ONE.  So, it's ridiculous to assume that Dell System Detect needs to install and run before we can download the image we need.   And if our Dell was working, we WOULDN'T NEED TO DO THE DOWNLOAD in the first place.

Like JKONTHEWEB and sedemdeh, I lost my operating system on my Dell.  I don't have the recovery disk.  I go to the Dell site to download it.  After providing the service tag #, I am told a download is available for me.  I select the files to download and tell it to download them.   Instead of downloading the files selected, it downloads Dell System Detect instead.  I install that.  But of course I am not doing this on the Dell in question, BECAUSE THE DELL HAS NO OPERATING SYSTEM.   It then remains stuck in this loop of telling me to download and run DSD, and won't let me do the download so I can fix my Dell.

Isn't this site Dell?   The URL says it's Dell.   So why can't we get some simple help solving this problem?   Why does this problem exist in the first place?   It is senseless.

JKONTHEWEB and sedemdeh:  Did you ever get any real solutions to this problem?  If you receive this reply. and if you were ever able to solve this ridiculous problem, please reply and tell all of us what you did.

Dear bmeyette,

the Dell support website will make the media available only if the machine whose tag number you provide has the entitlements to install that media. For instance, if you purchased your computer with a Windows 7 OEM license and in the support page you choose a Windows 10 operating system, you will have the possibility to download the Windows 10 drivers, but we will not supply the Windows 10 OEM media. To be able to download the OEM OS media, you must select the correct operating system.

In order to download your recovery media, could you please attempt the following:
- Connect to the page www.dell.com/support . You will be asked to provide a tag number (it is a seven character alphanumeric number identifying your machine, that can be found on a sticker on your desktop/laptop); this number does not have to correspond to the machine you are using, so you can provide the tag number of a machine that currently has no OS. You will be directed to a page with content specific to the machine whose tag you supplied.

- In that page you can open the section "Drivers and downloads", and from there choose the tag "Find it myself".

- In the upper par of the page you will be shown the operating system to which the downloadable contents correspond. You have the choice to "Change OS". If you choose an OS for which your computer has an OEM license, you will see the category "Operating System" appear in the page. For instance, if your system has been ordered with Windows 7 64bit and you choose this OS, you will have the chance to download the OS.

- Once the Operating System category is visible, if you choose it and follow the link to download the OS, you will (according to your location and to the URL you connect to) either be able to directly download the OS media (I have just tried from a non-Dell system located in Switzerland and I was able to start the download) or you can download the Dell OS Recovery Tool;

- If you downloaded the Dell OS Recovery Tool you can install it on any PC (also non-Dell systems), start it, choose to download the restore media for a different system from the one in use, provide the tag number of the machine for which you need an OS media, and then launch the download.

Please let me know if you encounter any difficulties. In case you do you could write us at EMEA_OSImaging@Dell.com and I will help you to download the media.

Regards
Mattia

Yes I solved my problem, no thanks to Dell.  The nonsensical answers are still coming in from them ... I just ignore them at this point.   One sent me to the Dell site in India, where I was told the image was.  NOT.  Then more pointing in the wrong places, including several messages right back to same problem I described to begin with.

The way I solved it was to order the replacement SSD I needed from a third-party vendor who included an original Dell DVD with the original Win 8 OS for what i think was $3 more than the cost of the SSD without it.  That worked first shot, and then I did a free upgrade to Win 10 through Microsoft.

Dell can go you know what.

Dear JKONTHEWEB,

I am glad to read that you could solve the problem. As I made clear in my previous answer, the Dell website and/or the Dell tools made available on the site will only allow you to download an OS your machine has the digital entitlements for. If you ordered a machine with Windows 8 OEM, you will be able to download the corresponding OEM edition of Windows 8, if you ordered Windows 7 you will be able to download the same edition of Windows 7 and so on and so forth. If you ordered an N-System (hardware without OS), no link to download an operating system will be provided.

As a consequence, if you have a machine that was ordered with Windows 8 you will not be able to download a Windows 10 installation medium and we are not allowed to provide it under Microsoft's rules.

Concerning the free Windows 10 Upgrade, the campaign has ended in 2016 (see this Microsoft page for reference support.microsoft.com/.../windows-10-upgrade-faq ). There are several ways to upgrade to Windows 10, but you will need a license key unless your system had been already upgraded to Windows 10 by the end of July 2016 and the upgrade of the system had reached the "Welcome" phase.

Regards,

Mattia

Hi Daniel, It seems I have the same problem mentioned above. When I tried to download my recovey image from Dell OS Recovery Tool, a message appeared saying: "there are no operating system images defined for the product". Please can you check why my service tag is not working for the download? I´m sending it to the email EMEA_OSImaging@Dell.com. Thanks, Flavia

I have NEVER gotten the Dell OS Recovery tool to work. I have tried multiple times on different systems. The process downloads the ISO fine, but when I get to the USB it can't ever find the ISO file. The error gives the file name, but it doesn't exist on the system. I have no idea what or where it downloaded. Why can't the program just give you an ISO file. I can burn it myself.

I too am just trying to create the OS media USB, and the OS Recovery Tool just shows an empty list for the OS image to download. I go to the support page, enter the service tag, and the download page does not show any "Find it myself" option or any other link to the ISO download.

Having bought a machine I believe it is imnportant to create this OS media before it is needed, and if Dell want to save pennies by not including it in the box then they need to make the download service effective. 

Dell, Please do not just reply with a "All you need to do is use the OS Recovery tool", because I am already using it' if there is a problem with the tool then Dell, and not me, need to fix it. I should not have to be my own IT department to create a simple USB drive with something that should have been provided in the box, and is something for which I have *already* paid.

I suppose we all need to put in a complaint with Dell, not that they care or listen to us. Next step is legal, I guess.

Hello,

On the Dell OS Recovery Tool, when I entered the service tag, it tells me "No OS images for the tag, though images exist for the product" I am just stuck.

The pc is  using  windows 10.

I would appreciate any help.

The tool does not work for anyone. Call Dell and have them send you the OS. Or most likely they will tell you to use the Microsoft Media recovery tool and use a basic version with none of the Dell installed apps.

But that doesn't help someone without another computer running the same version of Windows 10.