ThinkPad x31 type 2673 Y13 - freezing issues

[carlosvg86]

Dear fellow ThinkPadders,

I will have had my thinkpad for exactly 2 years this Christmass. I bought it on ebay.com, it was only 2 weeks old.

Yesterday I decided to restore it to the factory settings to get rid of all useless software and other crap installed in order to speed up the machine. I just went into the ibm-mode before windows started up. I clicked on "restore to factory settings", and the whole system reinstalled itself without me having to use any recovery cds. This whole process took about 2 hours, I did all the updates and at first everything seemed fine.

Afterwards when surfing the net and downloading windows live, the system suddenly froze, completely out of the blue. The screen froze, nothing changed, no input was accepted - mouse and keyboard. I had to reset the laptop with the power button.

This had never happened during the 2 years of ownership before, so I'm pretty sure this has something to do with the recovery. I have been looking on multiple fora and it-websites, but I can't find any relevant information.

Has anyone of you guys had any experience with this? Should I use my 5 recovery cd-roms? How do I use them? I'm really annoyed! This is my only computer and I need it for university, personal fun and financial stuff.

If anyone could help me I will be very very pleased!

thanks guys!


Carlos Vangilbergen - Belgium

[BillMorrow]

ALWAYS make the recovery CD set..
then run the restore..
then make another recovery CD set and put it away in a safe place that you will REMEMBER when you need it..

what i do is create a pure original OS, add acronis true image and then make a system backup..
so i have several ways to recover if bad things happen..

you did not say which operating system is installed..

also, did you upgrade the various drivers.. ?

if you restored to factory specs you also restored all the clutter that originally came with the X31..

i'm sure others with mnore recent experience with the X31 will be along to offer more help..
welcome to the forum..

[carlosvg86]

Hey, thanks for the fast reply! There's just a couple of things I didn't understand from your explanation. Oh yes, forgot to explain I have windows xp, updated from SP2 to SP3, and I updated all drivers with ibm software.

- add acronis true image? how do I do this?
- how do I use the recovery cds? do I boot from them?
- what do u mean with the original clutter that came with the x31?

thanks for your help! this is actually my first post on this forum, and I'm really pleased with the fast, decent feedback!

grtz,


Carlos Vangilbergen

ALWAYS make the recovery CD set..
then run the restore..
then make another recovery CD set and put it away in a safe place that you will REMEMBER when you need it..

what i do is create a pure original OS, add acronis true image and then make a system backup..
so i have several ways to recover if bad things happen..

you did not say which operating system is installed..

also, did you upgrade the various drivers.. ?

if you restored to factory specs you also restored all the clutter that originally came with the X31..

i'm sure others with mnore recent experience with the X31 will be along to offer more help..
welcome to the forum..

[godling]

Well, you don't sound that tech savvy, and yet you completed a successful image restore from the IBM button (okay, they do make that easy ... but you thought of it, which is good!)

The "original clutter" is all the BS that IBM included with the original image that is unnecessary. I never had an original build, as I bought mine off ebay as well, but it had already been wiped clean by the former owner. This kind of stuff is typically Internet access offers, "free" software that works at 50% until you purchase it, extra little software applications that are redundant to what exists in the OS, plus boatloads of drivers you don't need.

Unfortunately, I can't tell you how to use the recovery CDs, as I've never owned them.

Acronis True Image, however, is a backup / restore software package. It's a commercial app, but has a 30-day free trial for the full version. Trusted download: http://download.cnet.com/Acronis-True-I ... 68093.html

that answers those questions, sort of ...

Now, if you're really savvy ... you could try building an nLite version of XP. There are lots of guides online, and even a few images that you might be able to use. Best bet is always to build your own, of course. But nLite allows you to take an OS (in this case, WinXP), and cut out the flak, leaving just the bare stuff you need. ((I was able to clip about 200MB out of my installation image, which resulted in a MUCH leaner operating system after install, and therefore much faster performance. And that was on the old 5400RPM Hitachi drive, which wasn't a spectacular performer. I'm tempted to do the same install on the SSD I'm running right now, but I just put my commercial purchase of Win7 on it, and don't feel like dickering with it anymore, as I've got two more full systems to backup, re-install, then restore, in my copious amounts of spare time. )

Hope this helps ...

-J