X220 recovery fails with "cannot find the backup files"

[turnstyle]

Hi all, I'm trying to rebuild an X220.

When I boot to the recovery utility, it seems like it's going to let me restore -- but I wind up with a message that says "cannot find the backup files."

I don't think I ever touched the recovery partition, and I appear to to have a 1.7GB partition named SYSTEM_DRV.

Any advice?

If I can't get the built-in recovery to work -- if I instead use a Windows 7 install DVD, can I use the Windows License Key I see in my X220 battery compartment? Or is that License Key not going to work with the install from a DVD?

Thanks!