Restore to factory settings in Windows 7 with dual-booted Ubuntu

Question

My laptop unit (Acer Aspire E 14) just came back to me days ago after undergoing a warranty service due to some malfunctions in its motherboard.

The problem is, since the day I got it back, both OS are somewhat corrupted, first the Ubuntu won't boot and will just stuck to its startup, on the other hand Windows 7 would boot and seems to be perfectly fine, but some icons/drivers/system files seems to be missing or corrupted. The service center told me that "maybe" both OS are "foreign" to the new motherboard of my unit, and that's why it turned out like this.

So I just resorted to reinstalling both OS. Reinstalling Ubuntu was okay, it went smoothly fine. Then goes Windows 7. The question I've been pondering is, if ever I use the "Restore to factory settings" option in the "Backup and Restore" in Windows 7, would it affect my Ubuntu?

I don't care about my files in Windows 7 anymore, but I do care of my installed setups in the Ubuntu. It would be a hassle to reinstall Ubuntu IF EVER the Windows 7 restore factory settings would affect it.

So, does it?

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

This option will reset the mbr, so you won't be able to boot ubuntu anymore, without reinstalling grub : https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Grub2/Installing

So, prepare a live CD (or a bootable USB key) before proceeding.

I highly recommend you to create - and check - an image of your whole disk (with Clonezilla for example) before restoring Windows. In case of problem, you'll be able to restore ubuntu and windows in their exact actual states.