Solution to lost ThinkVantage button access to hidden parition in thinkpad

Too many people have asked this question, involving cases such as

1. I did X and now my blue button cannot access the Hidden partition
2. I can go to the hidden parition but I cannot start the factory restore
3. My factory restore / clean install load tons of crapware and my computer is slow
4. What are the Thinkvantage / bloatware /crapware that I can take out during factory restore?

 

Here may be an answer.

 

WARNING

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1. Please backup your laptop drive to an external source BEFORE you start
2. If anything goes wrong, the author will not be responsible for your woes. This works for me, but you may screw up
3. It is OKAY for you to play around with step 1 to 22, if you execute step 23, then a and b applies

 

Background

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Lenovo provides a tool known as the Base Software Adminstrator here

 

Running it allows you to create 2 files. First is the manifest files which list the files inside your hidden partition that you want to install during a factory restore. Second is a personalisation file that customised your Window XP/Vista (example Administrator password, country zone, user names etc).

 

Procedure

 

1) BACKUP Your important data on your thinkpad harddisk to an EXTERNAL location before you start

2) Download the 2MB softwre, run it

 

3) Create a new Manifest file

 

 

4) On the left (where the mouse arrow is), your hidden parition contains 3 zones, the restricted won’t show up during factory restore. The optional will let you choose what to restore and the require….? (yes you guess it). On the right you will see the applicaiton button, the drivers button and the system drivers button which can be press (toggled)

5) Click the restricted zone and you will find that they is nothing there. We will now begin to put things here.

6) Let start with the optional files, click on the optional tab on the left as shown, then click on the application toggle switch to hide the applicaitons. The list here shows the drivers/system drivers inside my X60 tablet, yours will be different. For me, I selected ALL of them, right click and move them to the restricted zone.

The reason is that these drivers are optional and most likely they are older versions. After you have completed your factory restore, you can download lenovo system update tools and get the latest drivers anyway, which is also ‘cleaner’. 

7) Click on the restricted zone and you will see those files you just moved. If you made an error, well just move them back.

 

8) Now click on the Optional zone again and toggle the applicaitons back on. Do you really need Acrobat Reader? diskeeper? If not, select and move them to the restricted zone. For me I select most of them because new ones are out there. For example you can see Sun JRE 1.5.06? This is a 100MB file which I would gladly NOT install as the latest version 6 is on the internet.

9) For me, the only files I left in the optional are these. If you don’t need or like the wallpaper (the tablet pen) or the theme, then move them to restricted as well

 

10) Now click onto the requried zone. My advice is to LEAVE THESE FILES ALONE if you don’t know what you are moving, especially the system driver/drivers.

 

11) Toggle the drivers/system drivers OFF and leave only the applicatons on, as mentioned, leave these alone unless you know which applicaiton to take out (they are in the REQUIRED zone for a reason). For example, if you know your wirelss/Wan device, you can probably take out Foxconn or Verizon as shown below if they are not your vendor.

 

12) when you finished, click the Settings down arrow on the right and you can set some settings. I would suggest leave it at Full factory restore/custom factory recovery so that you get a choice.

 

 

13) If you already download some updates and kept it somewhere OFFline, you can enter some info here, if not leave these blank.

 

14)  Save your manifest file

 

 

15) Store your manifest files somewhere

 

16) Now create a personaliztion file

 

17) You can enter your User name, country time zone etc

 

 

18) If you enter an Adminstrator password, PLEASE Remember to remove your personalisation file from the hideen partition BEFORE you sell that thinkpad or the next poor guy will not be able to guess that password

 

 

19) save your personalisation file. Now comes the fun part, click tool->deploy as shown

20) Browse to the saved manifest and personalisation files that you have created and add to the hidden partition. As shown the two files of mine in the Hidden partition

 

 

21)

 

 

22)

 

 

23) IMPORTANT!!! up to this point if you quit the program you are still okay.

 

When you press next you will come to this last page. Tick the "automatically recover system upon reboot" if you have lost access to the hidden partiion from the blue button or F11. Restart and your factory restore will START.

 

 

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