SOS!boot/predestop problem of a cleaned T41p

[bidone]

As I have looked here for solutions for my dual boot thinkpad which can not be recovered from the HPA, I have put the hope in bring it to the factory setting by cleaning it with the recovery disks. (got from IBM.) But problems are still around and I will write down what I have done and seen, and pls help me out! thanks!

1. Before using recovery disks:

As the weird thing happened in windows that the 'right-click' operation of any file will last 1 minute and using lots of CPU/memory,
I couldn't find out the reason, and then decided to reinstall XP from the HPA, but after I tried from 'access IBM', the error appeared
'Application authentication has failed. This application cannot be loaded.'.
Very limited info can be found from googling this error and I thought it must be the HPA is corrupted.
I tried PQMagic, but got an error from the beginning and saying something like the partition geometry has been changed by other tool (pretty similar as what I got after inserting the first recovery disk).
So I thought the recovery disks might work here.

2. During the recovery

After I inserted the 1st cd, this warning poped out:
'disk 1 (53798MB 7287c 240h 63s) appears to have partitions created using a different drive geometry (255h 63s).
This serious problem can lead to data loss.
No partition manipulations should be made to this disk using this product or the operating system's products.
You should back up your data on this disk, delete all partitions, create new partitions under the new drive geometry
and them restore your data using this back up.'

As I said, it is pretty much the same as PQmagic said before.
I didn't pay attention to it and let the recovery continuing.
After done the 5 disks and the machine restarted, Grub still came out and can't boot into anything, so went back and forth...
I pushed 'access IBM', tried 'recovery to the factory', the old
error 'Application authentication has failed. This application cannot be loaded.' came again.

3. delete partitions with fdisk in linux.

I booted into 'rescue system' with my SUSE livecd, checked with fdisk, and saw that every partition is still there...
Ok, then I realized the earlier warning, and I deleted the partitions in fdisk (am afraid it didn't touch the predesktop as fdisk didn't list it in the table even I have disabled the predektop in bios security.)

4. Run through the 5 recovery disks again and this time, no complaining about partition geometry....
BUT, Grub came to take the booting again and gave "error 22";
enter the 'access IBM', and 'recovery to the factory' still refuses to work as the usual: 'Application authentication has failed. This application cannot be loaded.'.



1. Basically I don't know what it will be after recovery from the disks: Should the 'recovery to the factory' from 'access IBM' be able to work or not?

2. Is the machine supposed to boot from XP already after the recovery? Is the main problem now to get rid of Grub? but how?
I searched around and all suggest to do it in Windows, but I can't
get into windows since I even don't have a boot cd!!


Sorry for such a long post, I am just afraid to miss telling you any step which may be significant,
and really appreciate it if you even read it through...

Any ideas or suggested post-reading??
Tons of Thanks!!!

[egibbs]

Can you get a PC Doctor CD? If so use the "Full Erase HDD" function in PC Doctor to completely wipe the drive then recover again.

If not there must be a similar command in Linux but I don't know it.

Or you could try using the IBM Master Boot Record repair tool to see if restoring the MBR will restore access to the R&R environment.

Ed Gibbs

[Dead1nside]

Sounds like you need to boot into the Windows Recovery Console and use 'fixmbr' or the similiar command.

[GomJabbar]

If egibbs solution does not work for you, depending upon the brand of hard drive you have, you may be able to use one of the following tools to accomplish the same thing.

Hitachi Drive Fitness Test

Fujitsu Erase Utility