Thinkpads Forum

Is it possible to do a clean install of XP on one partition of the hard drive without removing the thinkvantage vista recovery partition?

rubbish84 wrote:Is it possible to do a clean install of XP on one partition of the hard drive without removing the thinkvantage vista recovery partition?

Yes it is...just make sure you have created the Rescue & Recovery CD set and the separate emergency boot CD first.

Or, use one of the 3rd party programs to image your C: partition which is much faster than Rescue & Recovery. (like a few minutes vs. two freakin' hours with R&R)

The recovery partition cannot be deleted unless you use a 3rd party program.

mgo wrote:snip....The recovery partition cannot be deleted unless you use a 3rd party program.

The recovery partition can be deleted during installation of any new Operating System. The trick is while installing an OS, you shouldn't instruct the setup to format entire HDD if your preference to keep the hidden partition intact.

ryengineer wrote:

mgo wrote:snip....The recovery partition cannot be deleted unless you use a 3rd party program.

The recovery partition can be deleted during installation of any new Operating System. The trick is while installing an OS, you shouldn't instruct the setup to format entire HDD if your preference to keep the hidden partition intact.

I appreciate the correction. I will remember that so I do not mis-advise somebody else. Thanks.

I have made a set of recovery cd's through the rescue and recovery program. My only question is that you mentioned a seperate emergency boot cd, is that the first cd that is made by rescue and recovery? I was told to label it "Start Recovery Disc" is that what you're referring to or do I need to make another cd? If so how do I go about doing it?

rubbish84 wrote:I have made a set of recovery cd's through the rescue and recovery program. My only question is that you mentioned a seperate emergency boot cd, is that the first cd that is made by rescue and recovery? I was told to label it "Start Recovery Disc" is that what you're referring to or do I need to make another cd? If so how do I go about doing it?

It has been about two years since I worked with the recovery CD process (I use an imaging program instead because it is infinitely faster), but as I recall there is a separate menu item to create a special boot CD which appears separate from the Rescue & Recovery procedure. This was on four and five year old ThinkPads, and may not even apply today.

I can only tell you that having that separate emergency boot CD made it possible to recover three different machines, when it the recovery would have otherwise have been impossible, even with the Rescue & Recovery set which I had created.

During the three recovery procedures, the software specifically asked for that boot CD, (and not the first recovery CD) first, then I was able to continue with the recovery. As I remember, all three machines had lost thei special hidden factory partition which is part of Rescue & Recovery, and maybe that is why I had to use the boot disk. After I booted, the rest of the recovery CDs laid down the recovery partition first, and then re-installed the factory spec installation on C:\

I am not the most experienced user with Rescue & Recovery, but that was what I recall happening with the program.

I seriously doubt it. You'll need to wipe all partitions to load XP I expect. Please post if you find something different!

slagmi wrote:I seriously doubt it. You'll need to wipe all partitions to load XP I expect. Please post if you find something different!

not quite!

I will start from a different angle:

the mbr stores the position of the hidden recovery files/partition.
having experimented with various acronis true image versions, I found not restoring the mbr leaves a not functioning recovery partition! if this is the case, I wiped all other partitions and set the hidden partition active, so to make it the boot partition! ( using acronis disk director)
Doing this you will see recovery starting on both xp and vista! One thing you need not forget: Once rescue&recovery asks you to reboot, you must first change the active partitions to C: again! I do this using an acronis boot cd.

so, when i lay out a new drive, I only recover the hidden partition of either vista or xp, !!! change the position !!! of that to my liking on the disk, i.e. move it to the far end of my disk and go about setting up my system.

Once this is done, I backup my c: and hidden partition with true image, and store it externally.
When in need, I recover this using true image boot cd! ( never failed in full restore, in comparison to win based recovery !!!!)

Now, if you store two different hidden partitions, setting up your system the way I explained, doesnt make a difference, as long as you activate the correct partitions!

To me this seems a waste of space though, switching back and forth between vista and xp simply is a question of recovering the approriate image.

somewhat off-topic, but highly interesting:

acronis universal restore allows you to use one and the same partition on different chipsets!!! For example: using your anciant xp T40 partition on a recent X60 is no problem at all.

so the answer to rubbish84`s initial question is: yes, you can.
provided you go about it as i said. I presume having two hidden partitions and leaving the ibm recovery option decide which to use wont work. ( havent tried it, since my described way suffice me fully)

thormdac wrote:snip....so the answer to rubbish84`s initial question is: yes, you can. provided you go about it as i said. I presume having two hidden partitions and leaving the ibm recovery option decide which to use wont work. ( havent tried it, since my described way suffice me fully)

Clean install of Windows (as asked by OP) doesn't create hidden partition only Product recovery disks do.

ryengineer wrote:

thormdac wrote:snip....provided you go about it as i said.

Clean install of Windows (as asked by OP) doesn't create hidden partition only Product recovery disks do.

quite right, but on doing a clean xp install, you need not worry about loosing your vista hidden, since you backed it up externally, and you can recover it as i described.

Would it just make my life a lot easier to just buy the XP downgrade CD's from Lenovo for $50? At least that way I'm garunteed to have the recovery partition intact? Or will it be clogged up with "bloatware"?

rubbish84 wrote:Would it just make my life a lot easier to just buy the XP downgrade CD's from Lenovo for $50? At least that way I'm garunteed to have the recovery partition intact? Or will it be clogged up with "bloatware"?

Yes, that would be easier. The "bloatware" is super-easy to uninstall in Add/Remove in Control Panel after you get it up and running.

Other, more sophisticated users might tell you about different ways to dump the unwanted features, but their solutions are too daunting for my itty-bitty brain to comprehend. (tee-hee)

The reason I want to downgrade XP is I'm finding Vista far too slow, even with the 3 gigs of RAM that I have installed.
For example, to open a new tab in IE takes at least 10 secs.
I've spent a great deal of time trying to get rid of the bloatware that I would have thought would be slowing vista down, but it seems to be more of a vista issue than anything else. I like the way vista looks and some of the featuers but currently, it just doesn't seem functional enough to use. Maybe after SP1, it will be better.
Is that what everyone else is finding as well?

rubbish84 wrote:The reason I want to downgrade XP is I'm finding Vista far too slow, even with the 3 gigs of RAM that I have installed.
For example, to open a new tab in IE takes at least 10 secs.
I've spent a great deal of time trying to get rid of the bloatware that I would have thought would be slowing vista down, but it seems to be more of a vista issue than anything else. I like the way vista looks and some of the featuers but currently, it just doesn't seem functional enough to use. Maybe after SP1, it will be better.
Is that what everyone else is finding as well?

I make Vista run faster by running in "Classic" mode, rather than the overdone Vista desktop. I also make sure performance is set to max speed and I set Windows Explorer for Classic look. These simple adjustments make a big difference on all my ThinkPads, even the older ones. Get rid of the Aero and Sidebar, too.

I'll give thoes things a try before I decide if I'm going to opt for the downgrade to XP.
Thanks everyone for your help!

if you need help, i wrote a reformat guide for my t60 a while ago. some of it might not apply to you, and some of the article might be jibberjabber, but non the less its a reference.

http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... highlight=