If I only knew then....
I have sworn that I will never buy another preloaded machine again so many times it has become a mantra. Not only do you not get to customize it, learn about different things as you build it yourself, but you also get to lose all that oem crap.
btw, not only did hp decide to not give me a recovery cd, or cds with any of the progs (like I got 4 years ago from them) they decided it was not very important to have a 50 cent sound cable for my cdrom! Found that out a few weeks ago when I cracked open the case because I could get no sound from my cds in linux.
AAARRRGGHHHHH!