The trouble with a "complete original factory restoration" is that you will lose all your saved documents etc.
There are several different ways you could go...
The most simple way:
You could remove the hard disk and connect it to another Windows computer using a USB adapter. There you can copy all your docs from it onto another hard disk or DVDs. Then it will be OK to do a full restore to the original factory state, and then copy your docs back. With this method, you will need to reinstall your programs.
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There are other repair plans you could use instead, if you want to avoid having to start from scratch with a fresh Vista OS, so you can keep your installed programs and settings in Vista -- by only fixing Vista's bootup. This should be possible but it's a bit more complicated to sort out.
The Ubuntu installer has a few options, such as installing its Grub bootlaoder into the MBR or into the Linux partition. Therefore I can't be sure what the current situation is. So I have to write methods which cover all the possible changes made by installing Linux.
Alternative plans all have the same goals:
- if the Linux installer replaced the MBR boot code with Grub's code, restore the standard MBR code which always boots whichever partition is set Active in the partition table.
- if the Linux installer changed which partition is set Active, change it back to Vista's partition being the active one.
- if the Linux installer overwrote some of Vista's startup code on Vista's partition, restore Vista's code there.
EasyBCD can do all those things (except maybe switching which partition is set Active, which you could do just before running EasyBCD). Trouble is you can only run EasyBCD in Vista or XP booted from the hard disk.
Alternatively the Repair feature on the standard bootable Vista DVD can also fix those things. As this is a laptop you don't have a standard Vista DVD but I think the recovery disk you downloaded from neosmart includes Vista's boot repair thing.
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Before running EasyBCD, or the recovery disk's repair program, I would first check which partition is set active. Those repairers always write Vista's startup files onto the Active partition, and you want to be sure that will be Vista's partition.
You can do it by using the partition manager program on the Ubuntu live CD, without having to reinstall Linux onto the HD. It calls it "setting a partition's Boot Flag on" which means exactly the same as "setting it Active" which is what Windows calls it.
Setting a partition's Boot Flag on automatically removes the boot flag from every other partition, because only one partition on each hard disk can be the Active one (i.e. the partition which will get booted by the MBR).
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"If i reinstall ubuntu will that let me select another operating system when i reload "
That would probably work. It's an alternative to using the Vista boot repair on the recovery CD from neosmart, if you'd rather use EasyBCD.
You could install Ubuntu the same way you did before. When you reboot, Grub's boot menu should let you boot a choice of Linux or Vista (if not you can tweak Grub's settings while in Linux). In Vista, you could run EasyBCD to fix Vista's boot. EasyBCD includes a command for "Write MBR" which is probably the main thing which needs fixing.
IF the Ubuntu and Grub installer also changed which partition is set active (I'm not sure whether it does that) you will need to set it back to Vista's partition as described above, just before running EasyBCD.
By the way, after EasyBCD has switched it back to using Vista's boot loader instead of Grub, EasyBCD can optionally add Linux to Vista's boot menu (so the dual booting is being done by Vista instead of by Linux). If you intend to delete Linux you will only want Vista on the new boot menu of course.
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There's just one more problem:
With some brands of laptop, instead of the usual MBR code written by Vista it uses a special MBR code. That's how it enables the feature where you can press a certain Function key at startup to run the recovery program in the hidden recovery partition.
Probably Grub overwrote that.
After you fix the MBR (by using the downloaded recovery disk or EasyBCD) you will have Vista's standard code there, so you won't be able to press the Function key to start the recovery partition's program, if you ever need to in the future. I don't know how to work around that, except with special recovery CDs made for your laptop.
IF your kind of laptop does use an unusual MBR code like that, maybe you can get a copy of it to write onto your HD.
