But if you do have problems booting up your computer as normal, a recovery USB drive can save your system and restore access to your files and apps.

Thankfully, replacing your old-and-busted drive with a brand-new drive is one of the easiest upgrades you can make. Which drive should you get?

Open the Computer folder on your Windows 8 computer and click to open the "Computer" tab, if it isn't open already. Click the "Map Network Drive" button.

You can wipe a hard drive and data drives through your Windows 10 Settings, the DBAN utility, and the Disk Utility manager in a Mac's Recovery Mode.