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I have an old IBM ThinkPad R50e and a set of seven recovery CDs that were created before the laptop was ever used. The seven CDs consist of one boot CD and six data CDs.

I want to restore the computer to its factory state. I started with the boot CD, which opened an interface called "IBM Rescue and Recovery with Rapid Restore". I used the "Restore factory contents" button to initiate the recovery process. At the program's request, I then supplied each of the six data CDs. There were no error messages.

At the end of the process, the computer still boots into the same recovery interface (even though the recovery media is not in the CD drive). I have no idea how to continue from here. Any ideas?

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2 Answers

up vote 2 down vote accepted

I just did this for my T42, It had me wondering also, what you have to do is continue the process by selecting the "Restore Factory Contents" selection under "Rescue and Restore" on the left side.

This will continue the restore process.

When you recover from discs, it creates the C partition and the restore partition, it copies all the files from the discs to the hard drive, then you actually have to start the restore process from the rapid restore menu.

It is a long process with many reboots, so be patient and do not interrupt the Restore process.

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Long live documentation and user friendliness. Will try your suggestion. – bgbg May 2 '11 at 14:29
It's a lot more user friendly these days, fwiw. – Shinrai May 2 '11 at 14:29
I never did find documentation, I just took a chance and selected restore factory contents, figuring what did I have to lose, it worked. Seems IBM/Lenovo are the only ones that do it this way when recovering from discs. – Moab May 2 '11 at 14:52
Remember to rest the BIOS settings to default before using ThinkPad Recovery Discs. – paradroid May 4 '11 at 22:58
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up vote 1 down vote

From my experience, before using ThinkPad Recovery Discs, it is best to reset the BIOS settings to default, to avoid problems.

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