Installing Windows on a ThinkPad

[sechs]

Remember how I was talking about replacing the drive on the Thinkpad? Well, got a new laptop instead and the old one will be going to my sister, who is working on a business degree and could actually use it. I want to wipe Windows and reinstall it.

I don't really do work on laptops, so any hints or tips would be appreciated.

Also, if anyone happens to have an IBM/Lenovo OEM Windows disk, I'd like to get a copy of it. I have a Dell disk that, with appropriate hacking, should work, but, if I can get the real thing, that'd be better.

 

[CougTek]

You only need a vanilla Windows XP Pro OEM disk, not the one from Lenovo. Bittorrent exists for that. Don't use a Windows XP Pro corporate or retail disk as it won't accept the license glued on the bottom of your laptop.

As for the drivers, either auto-detect your laptop at Lenovo's web site or make yourself a driver DVD by putting all the packages you find at driverpacks.net. Once you've downloaded them all, unzip them and copy everything to a DVD (It takes 1.58GB overall). After the XP installation, just insert the driver DVD into the optical drive and update the driver for every unknown device in the device manager list. Tell Winblows to search the CD-ROM for the driver. It will take a while, but it will eventually find the most appropriate driver (and probably one more up-to-date than the one you'll find on Lenovo's web site). There will be a few things missing like the fingerprint recognition device, but for that you'll only have to download the driver and utility from Lenovo's web site.

Or you can save yourself all the re-installation trouble and simply run PC decrapfier on the already installed OS of your new notebook. Search Google for the registry modification to change the owner/organization memorized by the current installation.

Last but not least, take a picture of yourself smiling. Downsize it to 180x120 pixels and save it as a bitmap picture. Put it in the c:\Windows\System32 folder. Press the Windows and Pause key simultaneously. Admire your very personalized laptop.

 

[CougTek]

I forgot to tell to rename the picture "Oemlogo.bmp".

 

[sechs]

It's a Dell OEM disk, so, after hacking in the BIOS information for pre-activation, it should work fine. I just wanted to try to avoid the Dell goop.