6 weeks. I don't know crap about this stuff so I have learned a lot after the big crash. The most important lesson is this. If your PC won't let you make recovery disks properly, take it back to the store DAY ONE. I didn't on accounta I had a "back-up". My backup failed.

So, here is another VERY important lesson.

I decided I would bite the bullet and buy recovery disks or try to download them. I first decided to have a go at it to see what it was all about... and I am sending this from a fully recovered PC.... WITHOUT using recovery disks. I just used the wizard and it worked... no disks required. MS Vista.