A bit of a long shot but....

[mcvickj]

...I know there are several who work in the tech field.

I'm helping a friend get her IBM ThinkPad R40 up and running. She purchased it from a business sale. The only thing it came with was the laptop and the power cord. It is running Windows 2000. The license on the bottom of the laptop is for XP Pro. I thought I could use my OEM copy of XP Pro and use her key. Everything worked until I booted into Windows. It wants me to activate Windows and it says the CD key is invalid. I've tripple checked the key for any mistakes. I am going to need a copy of the Restore CD this thing was shipped with. I've posted this request on several different forums. Looking for a bite.

Ideas? Does anyone have this model? Maybe you could make an ISO of the CD and FTP the file to me?

 

[jon2]

Ebay has them. I got one for an IBM I just fixed and resold.

http://cgi.ebay.com/IBM-THINKPAD-LAPTOP-BOOT-CD-RECOVERY-RESTORE-BOOT-CD_W0QQitemZ7244786321QQihZ015QQcategoryZ67389QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

 

[Clintd]

I had the exact same laptop and the exact same problem. believe it or not even new it doesn't come with a XP disk. There is a hidden partition on the hard drive with the original OS on it. You have to go through the setup menu to restore the PC to original. The partition is so well hidden that even F-Disk doesn't find it. When I get home I'll look through my old manuals and get you the key combo to access the setup menu.

 

[jon2]

I was told the same thing but since I ordered the CD it was worth a try. Come to think of it, I had to call Microsoft to get the key validated.Hmmm.... The original OS must have been OEM and the version I got OEM but not validating on Microsoft. I wish I had the notes I took. I vowed not to get another IBM.

 

[Clintd]

I was told the same thing but since I ordered the CD it was worth a try. Come to think of it, I had to call Microsoft to get the key validated.Hmmm.... The original OS must have been OEM and the version I got OEM but not validating on Microsoft. I wish I had the notes I took. I vowed not to get another IBM.

When people started finding there way around the key, microsoft changed the way it was encoded. that happend about 3 time's so far.

 

[Clintd]

ok, I'm home and dug out the old manual. what you do is press the (Access IBM) button imedtly after powering it on. Then just follow the on screen prompt's for system restore.

 

[mcvickj]

Didn't know that.

It says IBM Rapid Restore PC is not installed. Press the enter key to reboot Windows and install IBM Rapid Restore PC.

EDIT: I selected the wrong option. This one looks better. IBM Product Recovery program. One moment...

 

[rocknbil]

OHHH GOD . . . NOT THE SYSTEM RESTORE . . . .

OK take this with a grain of salt, but I am a **big** IBM fan, I have several of them, laptop (different one than yours,) a tower and even an old 386 I just can't let go.

Lately IBM software support is really cheesy. I bought a brand new tower and had nothing but trouble with it until I formatted the drive and did a fresh clean install. It turns out the system restore contained Norton, and was actually installing corrupted Symantec registry keys! It wouldn't let me uninstall Symantec, kept crashing, was beginning to look like a piece of crap.

After hours of attempting to manually extract the evil bastard Norton from my system I finally gave up. Re-format, fresh XP install, it's now the best comp I've ever owned.

So my advice to you is bite the bullet and buy a clean copy of XP. Win 2000 is a resource hog, I have an unused copy here that I refuse to install on anything. But the system restore will indeed restore all the crappy things collected by IBM, most of which is unneccessary fritterware, but the worst being Norton. What you want is Grisoft AVG.

 

[mcvickj]

Well it is up and running. Thanks to Clintd. When the previous owner installed Windows 2000 they didn't trash the hidden partition. I didn't even know about this feature. First time dealing with an IBM machine. Pretty slick setup. Took FOREVER for it to get the image extracted and up and running. It is up and running and the owner is very happy. It only has 256Mb of RAM. It could really use another stick.

 

[rocknbil]

500 MB will allow it to limp along, 1GB is what you should really put in. Don't ask me how I know. And contrary to what IBM will tell you you do NOT need to use IBM RAM, just get the parity right and you can use anytihng, I prefer Kingston.