New 510 arrived - no disks

My new T510 just arrived and I unboxed all the contents. There are no disks for the operating system or anything else. Do I have to make recovery disks my self? If so what do I need CDs, DVDs, how many? Anything else I need to set this machine up properly?

Thanks for any help.

 

"My new T510 just arrived and I unboxed all the contents. There are no disks for the operating system or anything else. Do I have to make recovery disks my self? If so what do I need CDs, DVDs, how many? Anything else I need to set this machine up properly?"

Yes. You need to make them yourself.

Renee

 

Thanks Renee. Any idea what type/quantity of media I will need? The machine has Win 7 64 bit.

 

You will need three 4.7GB DVDs.

 

No, you don't - you need a CD for the first disk, and then two 4.7GB standard DVDs. You can burn the set by double clicking on the recovery partition (labeled "Lenovo") in your My Computer screen.

 

Thanks for the replies. I will grab some cds and dvds.

 

Ok fine. I used three DVDs since that's all I had, and it worked fine...

 

You don't get extra trackpoint caps either.

 

Why can't manufacture can't include reinstallation cd like the good old time and what apple is still doing.

 

Actually, I recomend using Windows Backup. Presumably, it'll always be around and will bw bw more abundant than Lenovo.

Renee

 

They don't include an installation CD because it costs money. It's one of the things they do that adds up to keep the price down. It's easier to write a program to have the buyer burn it off. If you're interested you can download a Windows CD in the Windows Forum.

 

How much do they save, maybe one couple of cents on each cd. I think they are betting that when consumer need to reinstall, they could sell it to the customer for x amount of dollar.

 

Laptop buyers try to wring every last dollar from the manufacturers who in turn cuts cost any way they can. Is it a lot of money? Probably not, but I'd venture to say it's more than a few cents. If you make millions of notebooks a year, it adds up. I don't see what the big deal is whether you get them in box or burn them off. You can download a windows disc anyway if needed.

 

The only thing is: How do you get back the applications pre-installed if you do not use the recovery disks? I know a lot of people do not like Roxio and WinDVD and may prefer something else or some freeware. For those who would prefer to use the software that had been pre-installed, how are they to reinstall without the disks? Dell provides all the disks, which means that you can reinstall what was on there before.

 

All the drivers and applications installed on your ThinkPad are located in the SWTools folder on the C:\ drive.

 

I think they stopped doing recovery disks because they are using a recovery partition on your hard drive. If you keep the thinkvantage button pressed during startup you will boot to this partition and it allows you to do a whole lot of recovery stuff.

I presume they think people who are going to delete this partition wont really need a recovery disk anyhow as they know what they are doing with computers. Also thinkpads are marketed as high end business laptops and I doubt any IT department at a company is going to need 100s of recovery disks.

BTW, I had to burn my own recovery disk on the HP desktop I purchased 8 years ago, no big deal.

 

If I am allow to burn a original copy of os without all the crapware, I will be happy as a clam. I know its not just lenovo not providing the disk, but the practice need to be stop.

 

Why not copy to memory stick or something? burning cds is just ridiculous

 

When you make the recovery disks, does that include the operating system? If down the road I want to get a new hard drive, how do I load my operating system on to the new drive?

 

I believe it is everything that is one the recovery partition of the hard drive, which include the lenovo's software and driver.

 

The recovery disks are little more than a disk image of the factory state of the hard drive, so using them will restore your computer back to the original state of when you received it, including the OS and all the programs that were installed when you received your Thinkpad.