Win7 clean install on new hard drive for R61i - pointers?

[mortonofski]

Hello all,

I'm planning on upgrading my R61i to Windows 7 when it comes out. However, since I've only got XP on here I need to do a clean install, and I figure that's as good a time as any to replace my existing hard drive (I used to think it would be impossible to fill an 80GB drive...). Does anyone have any pointers? Data migration shouldn't be an issue - my Thinkpad got caught in the rain not too long ago, and I was able to pop the drive into my desktop without difficulty, but my main concern is determining what Thinkpad applications are crucial to reinstall. Also, would it be possible to create a recovery partition on the new drive, or is that something I'd have to purchase a new drive through Lenovo to get (and consequently pay two or three times as much for)? Any other help would be much appreciated. Thank you very much!

-Mortonofski

[ZaZ]

Used to have a Mac with a 20MB hard drive. I remember thinking at the time what the ***** Expletives Removed by Moderator ***** am I going to do with 20MB? I would say you should put on only the ThinkVantage Tools you reasonably expect to use. For me that's Power Manger, UltraNav and Hard Drive Protection. You may differ. I don't know that Lenovo would make you buy a drive, but maybe a set of recovery discs, which you're probably right, they'll probably charge a lot. Another option would be some ghosting software. You can do your install and then make an image, which you can put back if need be. A Seagate drive gets you a free download of DiscWizard. It's a limited version of True Image. I use it myself in place of Rescue and Recovery.

[matram]

I just installed Win 7 on a clean 80G SSD. After installing all relevant drivers and utilities from Lenovos beta site 11 GB was taken.

Basically the only Thinkvantage utility I am using is the Power Manager. I found I do not need Presentation Director or Access Connection any longer.

Check Matt Kohut's blog at lenovoblogs.com he discusses what Thinkvantage utilities that will be useful on Win 7.

Mats

[Wendy]

The only suggestion I have is to make sure you have the most up to date bios. I did this recently and have no issues. I installed Win7 32bit.

[pae77]

I nuked the Lenovo recovery partition and use Acronis TIH 2010 to make scheduled image backups to an external drive as well as clones of my entire hard drive to spare laptop drives in the ultrabay (using ultra bay 2nd hard drive adapter).

Acronis enables you to put a bootable version of the program on a CD that you can use to boot from and restore your back up image if disaster strikes. Acronis also can put a version of itself in a special recovery "partition" (not sure if it's an actual partition) that you can boot into at startup before Windows boots just by hitting the F11 key and this provides another recovery method that doesn't require having the bootable CD. Also, if you want to use the space, Acronis can create a recovery partition with your backup data, but I don't see much point of wasting space on a backup on the same drive one is backing up. For me it is sufficient and preferable to have my system/data backups stored on various external drives.

I guess my point is, I see no utility in having a recovery partition that is going to restore my system to the original factory state (Vista), when I'm using W7. If I'm going to restore, I want to be able to restore my system image, not the original factory image. The only exception to this would be if I wanted to return the computer to the factory state to sell it. The original (burned) recovery disks are sufficient for this purpose.

So I would recommend getting rid of the Lenovo recovery partition and creating your own with a 3rd party app like Acronis. (Just make sure you have burned and verified your Lenovo recovery disks first so you will still have the ability to restore to factory state for purposes of resale.)