Custom Recovery Process

I just got a new T60p w/Vista Ultimate and want to "clean" it using Lenovo's 'Base Software Administrator' and do a custom restore. I basically want to get rid of things like aol, google picassa, norton, etc. and will probably keep most of the Thinkvantage apps.

I've read lots of posts but haven't seen anyone outline a basic procedure for doing this. Would someone mind doing this for me? I have never used a thinkpad before so a detailed step-by-step procedure on how to accomplish this would be a huge help. Or perhaps there's already something out there that you could point me to.

 

You should be able to find your answer here; discussed many times and many ways to do it.

http://jstigall.googlepages.com/t61clean.html

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=127358

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=119587

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=120228

http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=27721

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=129698&page=2

 

thanks, stallen. i read through your links (some of which I had read before). but i really need a detailed procedure on how to actually implement the clean/custom install.

i created backup and recovery disks and created a manifest file using "Base Software Admin". Now I just need to implement the recovery, but I don't know how exactly. I could probably just fool around but I don't want to destroy my laptop (or make it inoperable and painful to recover).

I'm guessing I just go to the "restore your system" in rescue and recovery and go through the 6 step process, but could someone verify that and let me know what items I should be checking as I go through the process.

I have rescue and recovery 4.0 but i'm not sure how to get to the area where people have said you can do a custom recovery and omit things like aol, google picassa, etc.

 

that's all you need. the only question - when you created manifest file, did you save it on the hidden recovery partition? BSA lets you do that, the partition letter is Z i guess.

if yes, now just turn off you laptop, then turn it on again and when thinkvantage logo appears press the thinkvantage button and it will lead you to recovery program. there simply start the recovery, the program will itself pick up the manifest file (providing you saved it to recovery partition), and will do everything you have set in the manifest file (e.g. will not install those programs you have unchecked or moved from 'required' to 'optional' or 'restricted' etc)

 

thanks, chatte. i'm having trouble seeing options in recovery that are similar to what people are referring to in their posts. i'm looking for a procedure to walk through the menus with as the choices are not that obvious to me.

i first choose 'restore your system' from the menu. i don't see anything about custom install - just 1.) restore hard drive from a backup (but if i'm doing this from the partition, i don't think this is the one i want; especially when i click it, nothing is listed under hard drive), 2.) restore windows os and apps from a backup (again same issue as in #1), 3.) restore hard drive to orig factory state -- this is the only 1 that looks like it might work, but when i go to the next step and look and 'choose which files to save from a list' (2 options in the middle that look like the only 'custom' choices) it just brings up directories with system files to choose from - nothing related to apps/patches like what I checks in the system base admin.

as i pointed out earlier, i am a complete novice on the thinkpad and really just need a pretty detailed procedure on how to implement the clean without screwing my system up and right now the menu items just aren't as obvious to me as i'm sure they are to everyone else. if there's a document on lenovo's site that would be great as well, i just haven't found one.

 

I haven't actually done a clean install yet. I've got all those links bookmarked for when my T61P arrives. Maybe you can fill in the gaps with a step-by-step guide when you get it figured out.

 

3.) is the option you need. and the next step is also right - you have to select 'custom' factory recovery.

after that, everything will entirely depend on how you've configured the manifest file. as you saw the program has three tabs: required, optional and restricted. those app/files that are in 'required' will install automatcally during the recovery process, i.e. without asking you. only those that are in 'optional' section will be displayed during the recovery giving you the option to choose whether to install them or not.

the main point of the BSA is to give you the possibility to change all of this. so everything what is in 'required' section you can move to 'optional' and vise versa. in addition, to make things simple, everything that you know you don't need you can move to the 'restricted' section - and those app/files automatically will not be installed.

now this is all hunky dory, the interesting question however is which files/applications can safely be unchecked, i.e. from the 'required' section, as it is very likely that not everything is truly 'required' there. maybe there is somebody who has figured it out....