Thinkpads Forum

Any experts on Thinkvantage Restore & Recovery here?

Apologies for a duplicate post. I put this in the Z series forum before I noticed that Restore is sometimes discussed here.

I have a 12 month old Z60m 100 GB disk, 2Ghz with XP Home.

For various reasons (Bluetooth and the Ricoh 4-in-1 both not working properly) I am considering restoring the OS back to its original state as delivered to me using the hidden partition.

I have partitioned my disk into a C: for the OS, D: for all my data and E: for a couple of games. (The hidden R&R drive is R: )

Several questions arise from thinking about how R&R might work:

1. Will R & R just recover the OS onto my modified C: partition, leaving D: & E: untouched? There is adequate space. Or will it insist on resetting the entire disk back to its original state - a single C: partition? That would mean a lot more work for me in recovering files from backup.

2. Will R&R leave the BIOS and embedded control program versions as they are, ie. with the most recent versions installed? Or will the BIOS also be reset?

3. Does R&R recover all the various non IBM/Lenovo add-ins that I have carefully removed? I suppose so if it sets out to rebuild C: to its virgin state.

4. Where is any documentation describing such points about the workings of R&R? Is there a good redbook about it? I want something more than the help, but perhaps not more than a chapter in a red book. The Setup & Troubleshooting Guide is not clear on these points.

Of course I will have to reinstall all my applications, including some that are in program folders on D: & E:

Despite owning several IBM PCs and Thinkpads over the years, I have been lucky so far and never needed to do an OS rebuild. But it now looks as if I shall have to learn about must be a painful and time wasting process.

The reasons?
Bluetooth is sick. The device seems OK, but the software won't work and won't uninstall or reinstall. "More recent version already present, install cannot continue." More recent than the latest from Lenovo? I think I must have installed the wrong update at some point and now I can't get rid of it.
The other problem is with the Ricoh device. Sw install won't work. It loops through retries and if I kill the install: Whoops: BSD! I don't know what the problem is and didn't notice when the trouble began.

Plus a few other lesser oddities.... The interface to the security chip at boot time seems flaky and sometimes fails.

The confusion between ThinkVantage Software installer and System Update over the last 12 months has not helped me to keep this box in a good state. Both have seemed to make different suggestions, to be out of date compared with the downloads web page, and to not always achieve the update indicated.

How have others fared with those tools?

1. I think it depends on which version of R&R you have. The older versions will wipe everything on your hard drive and put back the restore partition. Then it will reboot and restore your computer form the restore partition.
I have heard that the newer versions will allow you more control over the process, possible allowing you to keep partitions.

2. The Bios and embedded controller will not be affected.

3. See #1

4. Probably, IBM is generally very good at documentation. Search the IBM site. Maybe someone else will have a link.

These tools work fine if you want to return to an "out of the box" cofiguration.

To recover a modestly recent ThinkPad to its Shipped State, press the Access IBM key or press F11 and recovery. Partioning doesn't affect the PreDesktop Area unless you wiped it out (and many do for reasons that totally escape me). ... JD Hurst

If you Restore Factory Contents using Rescue and Recovery from the hard drive, it is my understanding that it will only reformat the C: partition (you will lose all data on the C: partition) and will not affect any other partitions (ie D:, E:, etc.). This will restore the original software image to the C: partition.

If you Restore Factory Contents using the Product Recovery Disc set, they will delete all partitions and restore your ThinkPad to the original software state.

The BIOS and Embedded Controller will be unaffected by either restore method.

Again, restoring to Factory Contents restores the C: partition to the original software state, with Windows and all the IBM/Lenovo utilities at the version levels that they were when the ThinkPad was new.

There are links on the following page to RnR documentation.
Rescue and Recovery v3.1 by Lenovo

EDIT: I should add that if you have upgraded Rescue and Recovery from the original version that came installed on your ThinkPad, you may lose the ability to boot into the Rescue and Recovery partition after Restoring Factory Contents. If you have not done it yet, burn a set of Product Recovery Disks before restoring your system.