Deleted recovery, no disc available...(long story)

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cbay

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Jan 4, 2013
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Neighbors got a new laptop. Didn't like it (windows 8). They are elderly and just

wanted something simple to play card games on, etc.

Tried to help them understand the new Os, no luck. They took it back to wally

world and asked what to do.

I offered to help them find one (bad idea no. 1)

Went online and discovered windows 7 laptops are getting very hard to find.

Finally found a few that appeared to be acceptable.

Decided to go with the lenovo b590.

Ordered it for them, finally came in set up initially and went online to find some free

online games for them. (bad idea no. 2) caught a nasty little virus, blew right past

the norton antivirus. realized it wasn't worth messing with and decided to reinstall the OS.

Realized i hadn't made a disc copy of the OS and decided to do that.

While it is copying to disc it flashed a blue screen and had something on there

about failed to copy (forgot exactly what it said, been a while now).

It gave me two options which i can't remember exactly what they were now (this is

a dead giveaway that i'm not qualified to be doing this in the first place) something

to either rescue the drive i was trying to copy or to copy it???

Either way, i chose the wrong option(bad idea no. 3). I think i chose to copy it

(continue what i was doing) and it tried to write over with something that wasn't

finished. Make sense?? I wish i could remember what exactly happened there.

Well, now that i had no OS, the rescue discs that came with the laptop were not

the same as what it came installed with. It was loaded with windows 7 pro and had

recovery for windows 8 pro.

Back up for a second. Yes i tried the recovery button and yes i had wiped out the

recovery partition. No luck there.

Now, i figure what the heck, i'll put W8 on there and maybe i can go back to 7 after

that, or get it up and running and tweak it to something they can use until i can

get a disc from lenovo for w7, etc.

The windows 8 recovery will not work for nothing. Tried multiple times. From

what i have come to understand it needs data from the original recovery partition

to install it. Lots of "failed to load CMI files"

So, now it decide to burn up lots of my satellite internet data usage and download

an iso copy of the windows 7 pro 64 that i need. After many attempts that would

get to .5g install i finally figured out i needed a download mgr. to get a download (imagine that).

Finally, got a copy and install, from what i had read to skip the key (which wasn't

anywhere to be found anyway), set up, went online with my pc and get some

drivers from lenovo site listed for the laptop. There were a bunch. Most loaded

after some effort, but could tell things were not exactly right. The laptop would go

into sleep mode and have to hold the power button on until it totally went out in

order to power back up. It also shows something about "failed to recognize c:

drive" after windows comes up. Doesn't cause any issues, but both of those problems will freak out the owners.

But,,, there is a bigger problem. The iso copy will not register with windows. I

used a key program and found it. Tried to register and it says can't with a default

key. From what i'm reading, it's not going to work. ???????

Back up on the process a little bit - I called lenovo and told them the backup failed

and it deleted the recovery and that i needed a disc, that i had only had it for a day

and they said not problem will be here in three days.

It never came so i called and now they tell me there is no recovery discs available for that model at this time and that they will have cs call me friday to figure out what to do.

Aside of getting a refund or a replacement from them - which it looks like they won't have a problem with, is there anything else that can be done?????
 

ratedk

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With what's been done so far, about the only thing you can do is install a legitimate copy of Windows 7 & start all over (again).

If you can log into the new windows installation, you may be given the option to validate windows and pay for a license key. It sounds like you've put enough time and effort into this already... You may want to wait and see what Lenovo has to say.
 

cbay

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Yeah i think i will wait on lenovo.
Aside of venting i figured it wouldn't hurt to describe the experience as best i could in case someone responded "You can get the key validated by........" or "there's a driver for that sleep mode problem", etc, etc, worth a try anyway..:wahoo:

 

cbay

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Was afraid they wouldn't and lenovo called today and said they would take care of it. They emailed a shipping ticket for fedex and it's boxed up and ready to go in the morning.
If i wouldn't have run into the other issues and lenovo wasn't friendly i would have sweated through it with a registered copy and done a better study on the driver situation with another install.
Too soon i guess to say it's all fine yet though. If they don't have discs to send me, they may not have w7 anymore and want to put w8 on there. That won't work with the customer; we shall see. :??:

 
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