How exactly do I go about restoring my T42? Need fast reply!

[hootpie]

A lot of T4X owners told me that the first thing I should do is reformat to get rid of the "fluff." I made restore discs, but all that gives me the option to do is to restore from a backup or to restore to factory specifications, which I think includes all that "fluff" that I'm trying to get rid of.

I thought about just using a regular Windows XP disc to reformat and reinstall Windows, but the CD keys obviously don't match.

How did you guys do it?

Edit: My restore discs are no longer working for some reason...is it possible to use T43 restore discs on a T42 (will the differing hardware present a problem, or are the restore discs pretty generic?)?

[kaiser]

I thought about just using a regular Windows XP disc to reformat and reinstall Windows, but the CD keys obviously don't match.

How did you guys do it?


Edit: My restore discs are no longer working for some reason...is it possible to use T43 restore discs on a T42 (will the differing hardware present a problem, or are the restore discs pretty generic?)?

If you want to use one of the CD-Keys found on your HDD and in the registry, you must use the I386 folder which is originally located on C: when you got your Thinkpad. With a tool like nlite (or similar) and some handwork you could build a CD which will unattended install a clean Windows, copies the activiation and installs IBMs Drivers and Software (as far as this is possible). I managed to build a Windows CD which installs most of the Drivers, Software and the Software-Installer and additionally Thunderbird and Firefox.

T43 uses another Chipset. So i bet the IBM Preload may not be compatible between T42/43.

---
Some links:
www.4saad.com/WhatsNew/Fresh_XP_Install/index.htm
www.nliteos.com
unattended.msfn.org

[jdhurst]

This debate goes on ad nauseum. The fluff is in Windows XP and you won't get rid of that by any install method, just by setting it properly after install. There is more to add if you delete and use a retail CD than there is to delete if you do a re-image. The only thing the you don't need (if it is still there) is Update Connector. Easy Eject can go but it doesn't harm anything or show its face. I would uninstall IBM Java and install the newest SUN Java. And you might wish to uninstall NAV to replace with your own choice (or you might not). The rest of the stuff is useful. Properly installed and set, the IBM apps use no perceptible CPU and not enough memory to worry about.

Be careful who you listen to. Somebody (probably in good faith) posted that there was 8Gb of junk on a new ThinkPad and that just is not so.

Finally, the re-image software sits in the Hidden Protected Area (HP) or Predesktop area. While this takes some reasonable space, it can be used to re-image your machine without CD's and is worthwhile to keep. It sits outside the partitionable space and does not use one of the available partitions. It is not a a partition itself (another misunderstood concept in here).
... JD Hurst

[Kyocera]

Here is the link referencing the 8G of junk. One mans junk is anothers mans treasure (or something corny like that)

http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=17228

[nirvana0001]

http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=3827

[davidspalding]

Me, I uninstalled Norton Bloatware and a very few others, but for the most point, the "fluff" that I found was lots and lots of utilities that help me get a lot out of my T.

Frankly, making those R&R discs out of the box, then another set a week later, after I'd done some personalizing and cleaning, was a Very Good Idea. From there ... the R&R backups to discs frustrate me because they insist on making a bootable first disc,... I tried the backup to local drive, copying to USB drive ... frankly, I'm happy that I'd ordered Norton Ghost, it is a far simpler and configurable backup solution. Now my initial Big Idea was to ghost the main partition, then do repartitioning, and a restore, after removing "fluff" and bloatware,... but Partition Magic didn't require the backup/restore ordeal at all. It made my desired changes on the fly (or rather, in a DOS boot environment). I couldn't be happier.