My wife has a Lenovo ThinkPad laptop which is about 15 years old. It
cannot boot into Windows. Lenovo's Repair cannot solve the problem.

The Acronis backup is no good because the laptop cannot reach Windows
to do anything. Only Lenovo's Repair comes on at boot. It cannot
solve the problem after running for about five minutes or so.

Does this sound like some computer repair outfit will be able to
somehow reach the original Windows install?

My wife did not receive a Windows 7 install disk with the machine when
purchased new.

I see the current price of Windows 7 installs are almost $400.

With all the choices of ISO, USB installs, product keys, etc., etc., I
don't have a clue what to do. If the repair shop cannot get to the
original installation, I ain't paying $400 bucks for an old OS.

I'd most likely buy a used computer with Windows 7 on it. My wife
likes Win 7. I, personally, wouldn't touch the MS spyware10 or 11.

I'm wondering what the chances are of reaching the original OS?

On Sat, 30 Jul 2022 02:53:07 -0500, carson@invalidated.com wrote:

>My wife has a Lenovo ThinkPad laptop which is about 15 years old. It
>cannot boot into Windows. Lenovo's Repair cannot solve the problem.
>

Sorry, wrong group.

On Sat, 30 Jul 2022 03:10:59 -0500, carson@invalidated.com wrote:

>On Sat, 30 Jul 2022 02:53:07 -0500, carson@invalidated.com wrote:
>
>>My wife has a Lenovo ThinkPad laptop which is about 15 years old. It
>>cannot boot into Windows. Lenovo's Repair cannot solve the problem.
>>
>
>Sorry, wrong group.

Nope. This is the right group.

Don't post after only five minutes of getting up. : (

On Sat, 30 Jul 2022 02:53:07 -0500, carson@invalidated.com wrote:

> My wife has a Lenovo ThinkPad laptop which is about 15 years old. It
> cannot boot into Windows. Lenovo's Repair cannot solve the problem.
>
> The Acronis backup is no good because the laptop cannot reach Windows
> to do anything. Only Lenovo's Repair comes on at boot. It cannot
> solve the problem after running for about five minutes or so.
>
> Does this sound like some computer repair outfit will be able to
> somehow reach the original Windows install?
>
> My wife did not receive a Windows 7 install disk with the machine when
> purchased new.
>
> I see the current price of Windows 7 installs are almost $400.
>
> With all the choices of ISO, USB installs, product keys, etc., etc., I
> don't have a clue what to do. If the repair shop cannot get to the
> original installation, I ain't paying $400 bucks for an old OS.
>
> I'd most likely buy a used computer with Windows 7 on it. My wife
> likes Win 7. I, personally, wouldn't touch the MS spyware10 or 11.
>
> I'm wondering what the chances are of reaching the original OS?

Easy enough if you have the product key, just re-install using the
MSFT win7 download iso. If no key, your options are more limited.
Maybe try a Linux disk to access and download the files, Linux talks
to ntfs filesystems these days.

On Sat, 30 Jul 2022 02:53:07 -0500, carson@invalidated.com wrote:

> I see the current price of Windows 7 installs are almost $400.

Check eBay for iso files with product key, at a lot less than $400.

On 7/30/2022 6:48 AM, mechanic wrote:
> On Sat, 30 Jul 2022 02:53:07 -0500, carson@invalidated.com wrote:
>
>> My wife has a Lenovo ThinkPad laptop which is about 15 years old. It
>> cannot boot into Windows. Lenovo's Repair cannot solve the problem.
>>
>> The Acronis backup is no good because the laptop cannot reach Windows
>> to do anything. Only Lenovo's Repair comes on at boot. It cannot
>> solve the problem after running for about five minutes or so.
>>
>> Does this sound like some computer repair outfit will be able to
>> somehow reach the original Windows install?
>>
>> My wife did not receive a Windows 7 install disk with the machine when
>> purchased new.
>>
>> I see the current price of Windows 7 installs are almost $400.
>>
>> With all the choices of ISO, USB installs, product keys, etc., etc., I
>> don't have a clue what to do. If the repair shop cannot get to the
>> original installation, I ain't paying $400 bucks for an old OS.
>>
>> I'd most likely buy a used computer with Windows 7 on it. My wife
>> likes Win 7. I, personally, wouldn't touch the MS spyware10 or 11.
>>
>> I'm wondering what the chances are of reaching the original OS?
>
> Easy enough if you have the product key, just re-install using the
> MSFT win7 download iso. If no key, your options are more limited.
> Maybe try a Linux disk to access and download the files, Linux talks
> to ntfs filesystems these days.
>

No and no.

The COA sticker on a Win7 royalty oem, does not quality as
a valid identifier for a download of the ISO. I think I
tested that with my Acer key, and it told me to go away.

As far as Microsoft is concerned, it's up to Lenovo to
take care of their customer, not Microsoft. That's why
they thrown all the OEM customers into the dumper.

When I bought a Win7 from the computer store, the key
in that did qualify for a free download of the ISO. I
tested that too. Because I wanted to see at least *some*
key worked to get the ISO.

You can turn over some rocks and get one.

https://archive.org/details/7601.24214.1808011700.win7sp1ldrescrowclienthomepremiumx64freenus

Use aria2 with multiple download threads, to get that
file in a shorter time interval. Archive.org delivers at
about 345KB/sec or so for those big files. And if you
set up more connections using aria2, you will be better
able to fill your link. I have no idea what the connection
limit is on archive.org . At the time I used aria2 on
archive.org, I used the default 5 connections.

https://github.com/aria2/aria2/releases

aria2-1.36.0-win-64bit-build1.zip 2.3 MB # what I got back then

aria2c https://archive.org/...

I'm not crazy about the escrow version, but that's a keyword
I just popped into the search engine. Some of the escrow
versions are too big for a single layer DVD, so there is that aspect.

The Heidoc tool stopped being able to access Techbench
a couple years ago. And the DigitalRiver links have been
dead, well, forever.

*******

The Acronis backup image could be accessed from the Acronis CD.

This is why you read the instructions, particularly
the section on "bare metal restore". That's where you
learn about the importance of making the CD. Lots of
backup products make an emergency CD.

To run a computer these days, you must be "very handy with a shovel"
because of the amount of archival material you'll be required to shovel.

And the laptop should have a Win7 COA sticker, like mine does.
There's no need to be buying a license. On some Win7 machines,
you pull the battery, and the COA sticker is in the battery
bay, rather than on the very bottom of the laptop like mine.

Paul

<carson@invalidated.com> wrote

| The Acronis backup is no good because the laptop cannot reach Windows
| to do anything.

? That's not a backup. Backup means you should have a disk
image you can install to a new hard disk if necessary.

| Only Lenovo's Repair comes on at boot.

You may have already checked this, but there should
be a hidden restore partition. Look up how to boot into
that. If it doesn't work you might be able to do it by
setting that partition active. I once had a funky Vista
laptop that had the restore partition but was set to run
the wrong file! But if the restore partition is there you
should be able to get it to work.

If you do get it going, make a disk imafge, then replace
the hard disk and put the disk image on that. If it's 15 years
old then the hard disk is on borrowed time.

On 7/30/2022 3:53 AM, carson@invalidated.com wrote:
> My wife has a Lenovo ThinkPad laptop which is about 15 years old. It
> cannot boot into Windows. Lenovo's Repair cannot solve the problem.
>
> The Acronis backup is no good because the laptop cannot reach Windows
> to do anything. Only Lenovo's Repair comes on at boot. It cannot
> solve the problem after running for about five minutes or so.
>
> Does this sound like some computer repair outfit will be able to
> somehow reach the original Windows install?
>
> My wife did not receive a Windows 7 install disk with the machine when
> purchased new.
>
> I see the current price of Windows 7 installs are almost $400.
>
> With all the choices of ISO, USB installs, product keys, etc., etc., I
> don't have a clue what to do. If the repair shop cannot get to the
> original installation, I ain't paying $400 bucks for an old OS.
>
> I'd most likely buy a used computer with Windows 7 on it. My wife
> likes Win 7. I, personally, wouldn't touch the MS spyware10 or 11.
>
> I'm wondering what the chances are of reaching the original OS?
>

Didn't you make an Acronis CD ??? O.o

Didn't you make backup DVDs ??? O.o
My laptop kept pestering me to make those.

You're bound to have lots of bits and bobs
to dig your way out of this.

Acronis wrote a TIH for Seagate and WDC for
doing transfers from disk to disk when buying
new disk drives. It's quite possible the Acronis
in that case, knows how to read a TIH. It's even
possible there's a CD in there (I got a sniff of initrd).

The main problem with the Acronis in that case,
is how much longer Seagate and WDC will be hosting
that on their respective sites.

https://www.seagate.com/ca/en/support/downloads/discwizard/

693MB !!! At least one Seagate brand disk must be in the machine.

https://www.seagate.com/files/www-content/support-content/downloads/discwizard/_shared/downloads/SeagateDiscWizard_39818.exe

WD has their branded version of Acronis as well. Same deal.
To use this software, one of the disk drives must be
WD brand.

https://support.wdc.com/downloads.aspx?lang=en&p=502

And you'd only want those, if your collection of
Acronis materials on the *working* laptop, could
not make a boot CD for you for the *broken* laptop.

If the broken machine does not have an optical drive,
you can always convert the ISO with something like
Rufus (rufus.ie), for usage on a USB stick. And boot from
the USB stick.

*******

If you take your backup image to a repair shop with you,
DONT GIVE THEM YOUR ONLY COPY. Always keep a spare copy
at home. Plenty of computer repair shops have ERASED the
wrong material and done a poor job. This is why we don't
trust them with "only" copies of anything. Some of the
repair facilities have a "factory mindset" and do stupid
stuff all the time.

Paul

On Sat, 30 Jul 2022 02:53:07 -0500, carson@invalidated.com wrote:

>My wife has a Lenovo ThinkPad laptop which is about 15 years old. It
>cannot boot into Windows. Lenovo's Repair cannot solve the problem.

If her laptop has lasted for 15 years, she should consider herself
very lucky. Most don't last anywhere near that long.

I can't be sure, of course, but it's very likely that a critical
component has died. If it were me, I'd throw it away and buy a new
one.

On 7/30/22 02:53, carson@invalidated.com wrote:

[snip]

> I'm wondering what the chances are of reaching the original OS?

I don't like any version of Windows beyond 7. I don't use it unless I
have no choice (the only times that's happened has been for income tax
software, and testing my website on the old Edge).

--
Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.us/

"Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit
atrocities" -- Voltaire

carson@invalidated.com wrote:
> My wife has a Lenovo ThinkPad laptop which is about 15 years old. It
> cannot boot into Windows. Lenovo's Repair cannot solve the problem.
>
> The Acronis backup is no good because the laptop cannot reach Windows
> to do anything. Only Lenovo's Repair comes on at boot. It cannot
> solve the problem after running for about five minutes or so.
>
> Does this sound like some computer repair outfit will be able to
> somehow reach the original Windows install?
>
> My wife did not receive a Windows 7 install disk with the machine when
> purchased new.
>
> I see the current price of Windows 7 installs are almost $400.
>
> With all the choices of ISO, USB installs, product keys, etc., etc., I
> don't have a clue what to do. If the repair shop cannot get to the
> original installation, I ain't paying $400 bucks for an old OS.
>
> I'd most likely buy a used computer with Windows 7 on it. My wife
> likes Win 7. I, personally, wouldn't touch the MS spyware10 or 11.
>
> I'm wondering what the chances are of reaching the original OS?

Which Lenovo? T410?
The Win key on Win7 era Lenovos is on the battery tray under the
battery. That may not be the key that is on the hdd but it will work.
If you have the key then all you need is a $20 cd.
BTW, a SSD will be many times faster than the HDD.

On Sat, 30 Jul 2022 06:56:52 -0700, Ken Blake <Ken@invalid.news.com>
wrote:

>On Sat, 30 Jul 2022 02:53:07 -0500, carson@invalidated.com wrote:
>
>>My wife has a Lenovo ThinkPad laptop which is about 15 years old. It
>>cannot boot into Windows. Lenovo's Repair cannot solve the problem.
>
>
>If her laptop has lasted for 15 years, she should consider herself
>very lucky. Most don't last anywhere near that long.
>
>I can't be sure, of course, but it's very likely that a critical
>component has died. If it were me, I'd throw it away and buy a new
>one.

(Had to use a different news reader for this post. ES seems to have
went south on me.)

I think you are probably right. The cost of getting it straightened
out can be prohibitive. And I still won't have an install disk for
down the road. I don't understand why they didn't supply a Windows 7
disk with the machine. I still have a boxes full of stuff, including
install disks, that came with my new XP computers years back. The two
XP desktops I use are years older than her laptop. They still suit my
needs perfectly.

My wife did not have any important data on the laptop. She still
believes in paper over computers. And the paper is fairly secure in
our six foot 1,300 lb. safe. :o)

I guess I'm going to take your advice.

On Sat, 30 Jul 2022 11:26:45 -0500, Mark Lloyd <not.email@all.invalid>
wrote:

>On 7/30/22 02:53, carson@invalidated.com wrote:
>
>[snip]
>
>> I'm wondering what the chances are of reaching the original OS?
>
>I don't like any version of Windows beyond 7. I don't use it unless I
>have no choice (the only times that's happened has been for income tax
>software, and testing my website on the old Edge).

I HATE Windows 7. MS Redmond needed more $$$, so they took XP and
screwed it up totally and called it Windows 7.