AHH Thinkvantage Rescue and Recovery won't let me get into W

[chromecarz00]

So I'm having the error Windows failed to start; NLS data is missing or corrupt. What I've read on the internet told me said that I should enter the Windows Repair disk and proceed. I don't have an optic drive, nor was my tablet (X61T) shipped with discs. I've created a bootable image of the windows recovery disk on a USB, but when I enter it the only option is to go into thinkpad rescue and recovery. There's no way around this as far as I can see. Also, windows doesn't start at all, no safe mode, no last working configuration, none of those.

Thinkvantage R&R doesn't let me do the same repair function as Vista, nor can it restore from vista's backups as far as Ican see. The only option is Full restore, as quick restore is not pressable.

HELP! I don't even want this stupid program anymore, is there any way to uninstall it?

And I was going to just make a copy of the HD and factory reset it, but when I recovered all the files and was double checking, some of the files which I have hidden were missing, so I can't go about wiping it anymore. Please help!

[Harryc]

Here you go . $10 for a Vista recovery CD. http://systemdiscs.com/

[chromecarz00]

Hi,

Thanks for the response. There's two problems with that, one is that I don't have an optical drive (cant read cds), and two is that I've already mounted that on a USB drive and it doesn't let me get into windows recovery environment, only into Thinkpad's recovery, which is utterly useless.

Please help!

[Harryc]

Head on out to your local electronics store and get a USB optical drive.

[chromecarz00]

Hi,

I already have the recovery disk on USB, but the system won't let me boot into it, it only lets me boot into thinkvantage recovery...

[Harryc]

Hold down F12 on boot. Does the USB drive show up in the boot list?

[chromecarz00]

Yes, but when I boot from it, it somehow goes into thinkvantage recovery...i feel like it overrides the windows program or something

[Harryc]

The USB drive is not set up to boot correctly with the image that you downloaded. Try it in another PC to prove that.

[twillis449]

@harryc

Here you go . $10 for a Vista recovery CD. http://systemdiscs.com/

Thanks for steering people to that site. I'd made a complete PC disk image backup with Vista. Then I managed to somehow toast the Vista NTFS partition when I attempted a linux install on my wife's T60. The lenovo recovery disks (even those specific to T60 Vista business) don't seem to offer any way to restore from a backup with this format. I got really worried as my wife's entire life history in images was on that backup and I was dead meat if I couldn't get them back. But the recovery disk from systemdiscs.com did the trick!

[mnowell69]

I may be writing nonsense here, but whenever i have had to repair/restore the windows image on my X61 i have always had to start at the R and R screen. If the windows boot is broken the S drive ( SERVICE DRIVE if you still have factory settings) takes you to R and R, if you have a USB or CD/DVD image, it takes you to the R and R environment. All my other modern Thinkpads have taken me to R and R.