>>Avoid HP. They have one of the highest warranty repair rates, right around 25%.
>>http://www.squaretrade.com/laptop-reliability-1109/
>>
>>
>>>How about HP with 4GB and 500GB drive? My husband is at the store right now and they ask him which antivirus to install (and name 3 brands I only heard of Kaspresky and I don't think I heard anything good).
>>>
>>>Do you think he should take the HP?
>
>He bought the Asus, but they didn't give him a Windows 8 disk (Windows 8 is installed). Are they supposed to give the disk with Windows 8?

Most OEMs include utilities that let you create bootable "recovery" media ( series of DVDs, large USB stick etc. ). You can boot from the media and restore the system to its factory-fresh condition. That is pretty useless if you've installed lots of programs and data.

You can also create image backups in Windows 8 at any point in time - GIYF.

There seems to be a new "File History" feature you may find useful.