From the mail bag: Accidentally erased everything!

Kelly writes,

HELP! While attempting to remove an email account from my phone I erased everything. Now all I get is the phone set up screen. Since I do not have a phone account I fear that I have lost all my applications and everything. Can I restore it, or at least download the basic apps that were on the phone when I bought it?

Yikes! Sometimes the settings can confuse the best of us, and we imagine this sort of thing happens from time to time. For most people, it's an easy fix. Go through the setup you're seeing and get signed back in to Google. The apps that came with the phone will still be there, and anything you downloaded from the Android Market is still available, just not installed.

You can find all the apps you installed from Google here: https://play.google.com/apps. Make sure you're signed in on your web browser, and open each one you want to re-install and they will be sent right back to your phone.

Good luck, Kelly!

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Jerry Hildenbrand
Senior Editor — Google Ecosystem

Jerry is an amateur woodworker and struggling shade tree mechanic. There's nothing he can't take apart, but many things he can't reassemble. You'll find him writing and speaking his loud opinion on Android Central and occasionally on Twitter.