restoring dell to factory settings

I am working on a Dell Studio laptop that I want to restore to the factory settings to clear up some problems. ( I think some things were deleted that shouldn't have been. ) Already have everything needed backed up. Apparently the owner had tried to fix things by reinstalling the Vista Home Preminum OS. Except he used a 32 bit Vista disk for the install and the 64 bit Home Premuim was OEM. Apparently he can't find a 64 bit OS disk that should have come with the laptop and I don't have one to use to even temporarily boot from to try the factory restore.

Now when I use F8 and try to use the restore to factory settings option I get a message that says it can't repair the operating system it 'finds'. I can see the 'Recovery D:' partition when I explore. When I tried using the 32 bit disk he sent, it doesn't allow for the repair/restore to factory settings. Are there other keystrokes that might get me in to the restore
I'm really hoping for some ideas how to get this back to factory settings.

Thanks

Hello,

Follow the instructions in my post here:

http://www.geekpolice.net/tutorials-guides-f13/dell-system-recovery-partition-hotkey-instructions-dell-pc-restore-t7661.htm

See if it works for you.

I both held the CTRL+ F11 key and tapped F11 at the Dell screen. If I held it, it stopped/slowed the blue progress bar. I held it this way for several minutes. Wasn't sure how long it should take to see the restore option screen. If it was tapped then held I got continuous beeping and then it finally went on through to start Vista. I even tried to get them both held before the 'Dell' splash screen.
Should I have held it longer?
Thanks

Hmm... That's strange. Ok since you are able to boot into Windows, see if there is a restore option under the start menu.

I don't see anything besides a System Restore which isn't really what I need to do. ( I want to go back to original factory settings.) Any ideas where I might look? Should I try holding the CTRL + F11 longer? on start up?
Is there some way I can go into the Recovery D: partition and get it to work? I tried copying it to a SDcard or USB drive to see if it could reinstall from there.
Any other thoughts?
Thanks

Hello,

Try holding it long then. Only the D partition or the recovery CD will work. You can't install it from a USB media.