T42 won't leave Rescue and Recovery Program

[drbarnes4]

had to reload from R&R discs. All discs loaded, now caught in Rescue and Recovery Program and won't start WIN XP

[andyP Community SuperMod]

drbarnes4, welcome to the forum,

Please try the following; when starting press F11 to enter the R&R partition, when it's loaded click on restart and with a little luck, i.e. if I've guessed right, it will restart and boot into windows.

[drbarnes4]

Andy:

Thanks for the reply.  "F11" just threw me into a similar screen as "F12"--Didn't work. 

I wonder if there is a possibility I don't have the correct discs.  I am using to initiate the process:  Rescue and Recovery with Rapid Restore (Disc 1 of 1; March 2004).  The seven discs of the Product Recovery CD for ThinkPad R51,T42, T42p Type1829, .... Jan 2995.  (I had to use it to put a new hard drive in about seven months ago, and it seemed to work then.  My only concern is that the R n R with Rapid Restore Mar 2004 (P?N 19$91740) may not apply to Product Recovery CD (Jan 2005; P/N 24R7709; XP-P SP2/ EN/ FRU P/N 24R7684).  Probably doesn't make a difference, but thought I would ask.

David

[andyP Community SuperMod]

I think the cds are OK, what you describe sounds correct to me.

I would suggest running the process again with the following additional steps up front;

1) Download and create a bootable diskette or cd from Secure Data Disposal.

2) Set the Pre-Desktop Area in BIOS to disabled. F1 at boot > Secrity > Pre Desktop Area. (BIOS simulators can be found here if you want to have a look before you start changing things.) Also set CD as 1st boot device which you probably have anyway.

3) Run SDD from the diskette / cd at it's lowest level erasing 1st disk and not writing reports. - Shutdown

4) Run the recovery process from cds again. The HPA (Pre Desktop Area) will automatically be reset to normal.

Happy recovering.

[drbarnes4]

Andy:

Thanks for your input.  I have used the IBM program to securely delete the data on the disk as you have recommended.  In fact I have done it three times, with three differing levels of deletion.  AT the termination of the program, it still boots into the Rescue and Recovery partition.  I let it do that, then restart the computer, and it still reboots into the same Rescue and Recovery partition.  This is what makes me think perhaps I might hve mismatched initiation disk and the seven subsequent disks all of which are the same set.  Hopefully you will have another recommendation.  Thanks

David Barnes

[carbon_unit]

What happens if you try to restore to factory condition when it boots into rescue and recovery on the hard drive.
The cd's will restore the recovery partition and then you reboot into Rescue and Recovery to restore Windows from the recovery partition. In other words, you have to restore to factory condition twice. Once to create the restore partition and once to restore Windows.

[lctetro]

I am having the same problem trying to rebuild my brother-in-law's T42.  David, have you been able to find a resolution?  Thank You.

Regards

Larry Tetro T42 WinXP Sp2

[jyang49]

When it came back to the same screen, just follow the same steps again and click "Restore factory contents". It will then go through a different process and complete the install.

[infinitydist]

This is old but I know some will still have issues with this like I just did tonight.

After you install all 7 discs, remove disc 7 and reboot. It goes back to the R and R page.

Click -->  'Restore Factory Contents'  again like you did with CDs, only leave CD out of drive this time.

R and R will find the files from the discs, that are now on your hard drive and install them rest of the way. Windows will eventually pop up as it decompresses the files and installs them, it will run forever so just let it sit and watch the fireworks until it's all installed..