Thinkpads Forum

Hi,
Pretty new at this, so I appreciate any help and apologize beforehand for any mistakes.

Have a bit of an issue that I was hoping that I could get some help with.

I recently was given a T500 that has been restored to its factory settings. I think that it is a 2009 model, it has no operating system and is completely wiped of any data. Upon launch it goes straight into the Rescue and Recovery stage. My hope is that I will be able to install Windows 8 without having to wait two days for the installation DVD to be delivered. The system says that it can be logged on to the internet in R&R via ethernet.

Any suggestions? Is there anyway that I can do this? (Also have a mac that I thought I may be able to download the software and put it onto a usb to then plug into the Lenovo).

Thanks
E

Welcome to thinkpads.com!

Not quite sure exactly what your situation is, nor your intentions about downloading anything...

When one says that the system has been restored to "factory settings", it generally means that a working operating system has been loaded from the recovery disk set or that the Rescue and Recovery partition has been used to do the same. My understanding is that Windows 8 was never a factory option for the T500 so that running R&R is not going to get you a new Windows 8 installation. If you can provide the 7 character MODEL TYPE from the bar code label on the bottom of the case, we can tell you the original OS that the laptop shipped with (and what you probably can expect as an OS if you do run R&R).

If you intend on installing Windows 8 on the T500, I would recommend that you first wipe the drive before doing that. There are several utilities that can do the job (DBAN, most hard drive manufacturer's diagnostic program).