Quick Tip: What "Refresh" Means in Windows 10

Refreshing Your Operating System is
NOT Similar to Refreshing Your Screen

The term "Refresh" has been around since the days of MS-DOS. We've learned that the circle with an arrow icon stands for refresh, and that refreshing or reloading may help when things go wonky.  If you keep getting that "more stories" link on Facebook, images aren't loading, or your desktop suddenly looks strange, refreshing your screen has become almost second nature.  If things just don't look right, refresh.  99% of the time, that fixes things. We right-click and select "refresh," hit the F5 key, or click that circle with an arrow icon all the time to fix issues.

Then along comes Windows 10. Windows 10 was the first Operating System distributed primarily by downloading an update.   Few users have install disks, even if they bought a PC with Windows 10 pre-installed.  And Windows 10 looks A LOT different, confusing a lot of users.  All of the Tech Gurus tell new Windows 10 users not to worry, because it operates just the same.  All of the things that worked in previous versions of windows work in Windows 10.  The same keyboard shortcuts and right-click commands are there, and they perform just like they always did.

And so your PC starts acting up, and you're sure you should try the same old tricks you've tried in the past to avoid a visit from your Computer Person.  You start exploring the settings menu,  You click on the settings menu to try a system restore, when you come across the option to refresh your system. "Okay, let's try that," you think.  You tell Windows to refresh your PC, thinking it will just log you out of everything and reload it, similar to the way refresh works in every other situation.  Your PC reboots itself, and EVERYTHING is gone.  You panic.  "Where is my Quicken?  Where is my Outlook and all of my e-mails...it's can't be just all gone?  My games are gone, and I'd just reached that impossible level.  UGH!"

Welcome to the World of Windows 10, where refreshing your operating system is NOTHING like refreshing your screen. In Windows 10, refreshing your operating system reloads the OS entirely, resetting Windows to its out-of-the-box state.  It deletes ALL third-party applications and programs.  That means it will uninstall your graphics programs, your office applications, including MS Office and Outlook, your financial programs, and even your web browsers.  When the system reboots, you will have a clean, freshly installed copy of windows, free of all junkware AND legitimate programs.

If you are not careful, performing a refresh will also delete all of your personal files.  There IS an option to keep your files, but it is easy to overlook.  There is NO option to keep your programs and applications.  And this refresh process is irreversible.  There is no undo button nor way to roll it back. The System Reset process takes all of your system restore points along with all your programs and data.  You will need to reinstall EVERYTHING after resetting your PC.

There are really few occasions you'll want to refresh your operating system.  If you are less techhy and you have a Computer Person, I would certainly recommend you consult with that person before attempting a refresh.  You may find it is more expensive and a much bigger PITA to try to recover from a refresh than it is to have your person attempt less extreme measures first.  I have personally experienced the reset program getting caught in a loop, where it cannot finish and it cannot recover, causing blue screen after blue screen.  The ONLY solution to this is a clean install from a USB drive, and if you do not have one of those on hand, you will NOT be able to recover your computer without it, even from a backup image.


If you are at the point a system refresh is necessary, you are probably better off just doing a re-format and a clean reinstall. Personally, I have NEVER been able to recover a Windows 10 machine through the "troubleshooting tools" alone.  Something is always so corrupted that you need a FULL install drive to troubleshoot a Windows 10 machine.  I would NEVER suggest anyone attempt a refresh from the "Settings" menu.  Rather, you need to perform the refresh from the troubleshooting utility contained in your full Windows drive. If you do not have one, your Computer Person will.  And s/he will make sure your files are backed up so that you do not lose them during the refresh.

This post was prompted by a real case.  Someone brought me a system because she had lost everything, and wanted to know what she did.  I spent hours in the Microsoft KB, trying to see if there was ANYTHING we could do to recover, but the answer is no.  File recovery (using the free Recuva utility) managed to get back most of the data, including a few game save files.  Luckily, this was primarily a gaming and recipe PC, so the consequences were minimal.  This individual has learned NOT to try to reset her main PC though.

So in Windows 10, or in Windows 8.x for that matter, refreshing your system is a VERY different beast than a screen refresh.  Refreshing your screen just reloads everything on it; refreshing your PC performs a reinstall of the OS.  It is supposed to make it easier for novices to fix their own PCs. However, in my experience, it is just something that annoys and confuses the novice.  The non-tecchy user who is used to a refresh fixing things is not expecting something so extreme when they refresh a PC.

In windows 10, when it comes to the terms "refresh" or "reset" your OS, it does NOT mean reloading or resetting to defaults.  It does NOT mean merely removing personalizations.  Rather, it is what most of us would call "reformat and reinstall."  

Microsoft provides a good overview of the various Windows 10 recovery options at https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/12415/windows-10-recovery-options.  You can see, even Microsoft recommends you try System Restore BEFORE resetting.

If you're thinking about doing a refresh to ready your PC for donation, I'd suggest an additional step.  Run the reset utility and tell it to remove EVERYTHING.  Then download CCleaner and use its "wipe drive" utility to ensure nothing can be recovered.

In my opinion, probably the ONLY time you want to use this system refresh is when you are preparing a computer for a new home, or when your Computer Guru tells you it is the best option. Viruses, rootkits, and other Trojans can persist after a system refresh, so a clean install is a better option for virus recovery.  In fact, a clean install is almost ALWAYS preferable to a system refresh.

The most important thing is to never reset by mistake. You need to understand exactly what a reset does, and why it's rarely the best solution to your issues.  And you need to learn it's final and cannot be undone.  But the most important takeaway is that refreshing the OS is way more extreme than refreshing a screen.

---

NOTE: If you are looking for Part Two of the article on Internet Quizzes, it will run early next week.