Laptop w/ Recovery partition and no CD!!! What to do? 2

[wahnula]

Hello,

Upon my advice my sis just bought a Lenovo XP HomeSP2 core 2 duo laptop. After scrounging around looking for the OS CD I RTFM and found out THERE IS NO OS CD. I realize this is common now by reading here about "recovery partitions" that will be useless if the HDD takes a dump.

I have not nosed around in the recovery partition but my plan was to wipe the drive, install XPHome SP2 from separate CD and be free from the 11 million craplets in the systray. I would leave the recovery partition intact.

Is there a way to extract just the OS from that partition or would I be better off just uninstalling all the craplets and leaving the stock OS as-is? Opinions?

Tony

 

[biglebowski]

I have a lenovo laptop for work and it has the option to create recovery cd/dvd's but I don't know if it includes all their "very helpfull" apps. Try creating a recovery DVD and then uninstalling all the apps.

When I was born I was so suprised I didn't talk for 18 months

 

[tazzed]

Try using Bart's PE (

http://www.nu2.nu/pebuilder/

) but before you should make an image of your drive. Or you could reinstall using the restore partition and uninstall the Addons (Crap) you don't want and the make an image of the newly installed drive. you could reinstall from the image if you ever have to.

 

[wahnula]

All,

I played it safe, made a pile of recovery discs (one DID contain the OS only...I think). I then made a Restore Point, left all the Lenovo stuff on there, yanked everything else out by the short hairs, installed AVG, Office, etc. There is a litte, used-to-be-free app called Startup Cop that I installed for her, it's like a GUI for msconfig. Disabled 80% of the startup stuff now the pc boots in ~30 seconds like it should.

<rant>I realize this is why the laptop was so cheap, all the subsidized stuff, that then expires and nags you until you pony up $70/year for life, but who is looking out for Joe User? It was first viruses, then spyware, now it's bloated promotional apps slowing down his machine???</rant>

Being my sister lives 1200 miles away I was a little hesitant to wipe her new laptop's HDD, although that would be my recommendation were it for my use. Too much useless stuff. I have not looked at a non-homemade new computer boootup screen since 2000, the systray looks like a carnival midway.

Off to the airport, thanks for the replies.

Tony

 

[wolluf]

Tony - couldn't agree more with your rant - it applies to PCs too.

 

[kmcferrin]

Carnival midway! You're killing me.

Unfortunately, you are 100% correct.

 

[jlockley]

Good rant. After my own heart.
IS there a way to replace the OS in the recovery partition with an update? I have already updated my old W97 IBM with W2k, which was an act in itself. I'd like to have W2K in the recovery partition as well, but don't know how to go about it.

Note that this needs to be done via network or external CD.

 

[Nelviticus]

Just for info, instead of the "used-to-be-free app called Startup Cop" you can use a "still free app called Startup Control Panel" to do the same thing:

http://www.mlin.net/StartupCPL.shtml

I also highly recommend Startup Monitor by the same chap, also free.

Regards

Nelviticus