Thinkpads Forum

I am planning to wipe the hard drive to remove all vestiges of google desktop/toolbar, norton anything, and diskkeeper 'Lite'. I saw the handy guide posted in the forums. My goal is to reinstall ALL of the IBM/Lenovo tools/services after clean OS install.

Does anyone know if the "Software Installer for Windows 2000/XP - Notebooks" on the Lenovo support website will reinstall all necessary drivers and IBM/Lenovo software that came with the machine (including fingerprint software).

Thanks,
Clay

the only problem I ran into is getting the audio driver install. for some stupid reason the "software installer" version 3.50 will not install the HDA (high definition audio) driver and you can't installed the SundMax driver/software without it. May be the newer version 3.60 fixed this problem but eitherway this thread will be helpful:

http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=22732

Thanks for the reply. That is an excellent thread you linked to. I reviewed it earlier and wouldn't even attempt this clean install without it. Did you use the software installer from the lenovo website after you installed XP to restore your drivers and utilities?

Also were you able to restore all of the other programs/ like the bluetooth management, fingerprint security programs, dvd players etc.?

I don't have a recovery CD, but I plan on making one per the instructions on lenovo website before I undertake this procedure.

Yes, I used the software installer after fresh Window install. It works very well and lets you choose which utilities you want to install.

As far as I remember, it restored all the wireless management utility and fingerprint security software without a problem. However, I am not sure if it install the DVD player since I use PowerDVD.

The only utility software installer doesn't install for you is Rescue and Recovery but you can get it here:

http://www-306.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... AK.html%20

It's a big download tho so I hope you are not on dial-up.

Excellent. I am really impressed with the IBM/Lenovo pre-installed tools, the secure file deletion and the ability to set up a 'securedrive' partition in windows is pretty snappy. I will work on this tonight and try to get everything up an running before tomorrow morning.

Do you know anything about the imaging software on the lenovo website -- ImageUltra Builder. It looks like a pretty handy tool, but the website shows it as 'evaluation' so I was wondering if it was fully functional for a limited number of uses or until a certain date.

http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... MIGR-44316

Sounds like a neat program but never used it. I used Acronis TrueImage for my backup and restore needs. I highly recommend it.

http://www.acronis.com/homecomputing/pr ... trueimage/

Here is a review by PC Mag

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,4149,1091164,00.asp

Wow did I screw up! I did the clean install, updated all the drivers and I was unable to get my wireless connection to work. The wirless card connected to my home network without a problem out of the box so I thought I would do a system restore with the 'product recovery discs' that I made. Apparently the RnR should have made 1 resuce boot disc and 6 other cd's. Well mine only prompted me for 1 boot disc and 5 other discs. Anyway the boot disc worked fine and then RnR asked for the final cd. I put in disc 6 and it repeated the message "put in the last disc of the series" so i tried it again. No dice.

Now my hard drive has disappeared and I can't bring it back! I guess I'll call lenovo today and ask them for some product recovey cd's.

I have learned a valuable lesson. Just because I have performed clean installs on countless desktops, doesn't mean I can do it on a laptop <this was my first>.

Clean install of windows won't risk you lose the hidden IBM_Service partition.. unless you've deleted it.. otherwise you can always restore the whole Windows from ThinkVantage..

Although I did not delete the IBM service partition for my clean install of XP, when I tried to restore with my backup cd's the IBM partition was corrupted :Z

texans.fan wrote:Although I did not delete the IBM service partition for my clean install of XP, when I tried to restore with my backup cd's the IBM partition was corrupted :Z

Call IBM (Lenovo), they'll lend you the recovery CDs. And it's strange that you only burnt 6-CDs... I got totally 7-CDs.

Contacted Lenovo in Atlanta, GA. They are sending our recovery cds today. I have been able to restore my hard drive settings and reinstall XP. So far so good. This time I installed my LAN drivers after the INTEL drivers and hooked up physically to the Internet...Then I let the software installer do the rest. It has taken some time, but I am slowly coming back online...I haven't tried to connect using my wireless yet...for now I will just hope it works.

up and running now without a hitch. I'm downloading the Rescue and Recovery program from IBM now. There is still one error in the device manager:

Modem Device on High Definition Audio Bus

I've tried installing drivers from the DRIVERS/OTHER3 folder but so far no dice. I'll post if I figure it out.

-----EDIT-------
The driver was in DRIVERS/MODEM folder...duh
-----EDIT-------


Just as an amusing side note. When I installed .NET framework 1.1 for the Secure Data Disposal utility, installed 1.1, then rebooted ran windows update again, needed the Update to .NET 1.1, downloaded that and rebooted, then needed security update to .NET 1.1. Would it be that much of a nightmare to have the updated and patched version of .NET 1.1 in one file, Mr. Gates?

hmm....may be stupid question but it seem there is only few software that are not usefull...is it worth to do a clean install? Do you guys see a diference in performace or other with clean install...thanks

Not a stupid question at all. Knowing what I know now, it's probably not worth it...I would just unistall the Norton bloatware and the DK lite from the add/remove programs menu and move on.

However, it is nice to know that I could get everything back up and running normally from a point where Rescue and Recovery didn't even recognize my hard drive.

Thank you...now i can sleep better because that is exactly what i did without clean install........

I'm rebuilding a x60s without IBM's software (I haven't liked IBM Access Connections on my x40). I'm starting from a friend's image but he wasn't able to get the fingerprint reader to work. Anyone have success without installing a lot of other IBM software?

How about the Verizon drivers? Does it work well without the rest of IBM's software?