Hi,
With a new laptop, the first thing when you turn it on is to make the recovery disks.
Second, I would make a backup image of the whole drive to an external HD.
I use Acronis True Image to make the backup but you can also use a free version of Macrium Reflect, just go to
Free software downloads and software reviews - CNET Download.com and search for the free version, it is very easy to use and I installed it in every Laptop.
I don't think you'd have any problem installing W8 in your son's laptop, In fact you'll see a big improvement in term of speed.
My laptop is a 6 year old Sony Vaio and I have W8 running without any problem.
With every Laptop, there is a hidden partition where they store the recovery software. You can view it by right click on Computer->Manage->Disk Management, this partition is 10~15GB in size & usually does not have a Drive Letter assigned, that's why you won't see it in Windows Explorer.
For fresh install, use custom option, the next screen you'll see all the partitions: 100MB reserved, C: partition and the hidden Windows Recovery Partition. On the bottom of the screen, there's a button Disk options(advanced), high light the 100 MB reserved partition and click delete, do the same for C: partition, this becomes a single unallocated partition, next, click New, The installation will then create 2 partitions, a 350MB reserved and the rest is where Windows 8 will be installed, no need to format. Click next to proceed the installation.
It should not take more than 10 min to complete the whole installation procedure, Windows 8 will also install all the necessary drivers for the laptop except application such as webcam, you'd have to download from Sony Website, use version for Windows 7, it should work.
As long as you leave the Recovery Partition untouched, I don't think it will mess up the recovery console. windows 8 won't even see it to cause corruption.
NOTE: you could also allocate about 50GB for windows and use the rest for data storage, this will be more organized and make your life easy for backup & restore