Ok, so I said I would see you tomorrow and it is two weeks later, so sue me. The day I left the last post marked the day I inadvertently steered head on into a maelstrom of problems with my brand new laptop. This laptop that I spared no expense on, this laptop that I have on had since about a week before Christmas... became the center of my unhappy universe until recently. Be forewarned, this is a lengthy post, but hopefully it is worth the read.
When I first got the machine I began the usual clean and stock; getting rid of bloatware and installing all the software I can't live without. Somewhere in that process I muffed a step setting up some of the manufacturer software for a couple of devices. I didn't know where to fix it, and if I didn't I would go insane from disappointment thinking I was not getting the most from my machine that I spent so much hard earned money on. So I concluded that there is only one way to resolve this, a full factory restore. I had already spent about 10 hours configuring this system, so this decision was not made lightly. Now in the spirit of saving mother earth, Lenovo no longer sends all those software CDs and DVDs and instead puts a partition on your hard drive with all the system software backed up. At first I was miffed that they would slice off a 20GB chunk of my hard drive space for this, but then I realized how easy it made restoring the system and I rejoiced with great jubilation.
So for those of you keeping count, that is one full restore within only two days of having received the machine. Now this is where dread, disappointment and drudgery began to take their tolls on my memory because the details begin to get a little sketchy.
Now if I recall correctly, I think the next event was another voluntary restore due to something similar to the first go 'round. Again, at this point I had a couple of late nights into this and if you count the first time, restoring it again would effectively negate the fruits of almost a week of late nights spent configuring the system. Now I am not just talking about downloading Firefox and Google Earth, I am talking about installing and configuring the MS Office Suite, MS Expression Studio, SharePoint Designer, Photoshop, Sony Vegas, Camtasia, Snag-It, a handful of other favorite apps and most importantly the software and configurations that enable me to connect to the Microsoft network. If you think Vista has too many pain-in-the-ass security settings and protocols, then just imagine what you have to do to configure Vista to connect with an extremely secure and finicky network like Microsoft's. Now I know what you must be thinking, "But it is a Microsoft product and you are connecting to Microsoft's own network!" This fact affords me no greater ease in accomplishing this task, none whatsoever.
Still keeping count? Two system restores (still voluntary) and only one week of ownership. Yes I made the decision to restore so I should just suck it up, but I believe had I not restored then, I would have had to at some later date, so to me it made more sense to do it on my own terms. Here comes number three, or as I like to call it "Involuntary."
So at this point I thought I was out of the woods and everything was configured to a spectacularly efficient and pleasing degree. Life was good. Then one day, when I connected to the MS network, I got the reminder to change my network password. We are prompted to change this password at 70 day intervals for the obvious reason of maintaining tight security on all of Microsoft's valuable information. My friend Anthony just went through his own personal hell with changing his password and having it cause a myriad of problems that interrupted his work to no end and demanded hours of phone time with IT. Having seen this and in fact gone through the same thing myself quite some time ago, I avoided changing my password hoping that through some miracle I would be given exception to this rule and could continue to use my ancient password unmolested. The days began to count down and when I tried to figure it out, I couldn't recall why changing the password would cause such spectacular fail. So with only 36 hours until password reset deadline, I took the plunge. No BSOD, no crash, nothing, so I think to myself, "This ain't so bad, Anthony must have had his configured improperly, he didn't spend as much time being meticulous and thorough like I did, he he sucker." Now cut to when I start my machine the next morning and FAIL. Guess what genius, you locked yourself out of your user account and it was the ONLY admin user account on the system! After one solid day of denial fueled frantic tweaking, I finally huddled in a corner shakily licking my wounds and conceded defeat.
Next step? Anyone? Anyone? That's right, system restore... again. Tally is now at three full system restores to factory default and only about one-and-a-half to two weeks since first hitting the power button on this gem of modern technology. At this point, voluntary or not, my tolerance, patience and good humor were all wearing thin. Through a cloud of exasperation came a thought that quickly tempered my mood and saved me from what I can only guess would be disastrous results. I did my homework and found out why my computer could be so presumptuous as to lock me out, and how to circumvent it next go 'round. Armed with this new found knowledge that even the seasoned professionals at MS IT overlooked, I began the undertaking of my third restore with the desperate hope that it will be the last time.
This time fate had a curve ball I could never have anticipated. After beginning the restore process that I had become intimately familiar with, something wasn't right. There was some deterioration in performance and then the restore just failed and the computer restarted… Weird. I was assuming I would be taken back to the beginning the restore process, no biggy. I was wrong, dead wrong. After POST, I was told that it could not find an OS. WTF!? Now at this point I had flashes of watching myself channel the Greeks of old and turn this expensive piece of equipment into a discus and hurl it through whatever window was closest (at the time that would have been the living room window, just in case you were wondering). Now I must apologize for the length of this narrative, but I trust your tiring of reading can give you some small glimpse into my state of mind at this point, “How much longer can this really go on?”
I called Lenovo Tech Support and they were very helpful at telling me that once their suggestions had been exhausted, there was nothing I could do but restore the system. That little piece of irony was certainly not wasted on me. I explained that the system is not recognizing the OS much less the partition that the restore information is nestled away on. They asked me if I had made a copy of the restore information on disk, and of course I hadn’t; there was a partition on my hard drive with all of that info, why would I need a disk? And of course the answer to that question is: In case anything like this happens. Next move? Wait for a set of restore disks to be shipped out to me, so much for saving mother earth. After the performance of the postal service and various other parcel delivery services over the holidays, I was resigned to the fact that I would be left with a $2000 paper weight for a few weeks. The disks showed up after only the better part of one week, I installed them and after some tweaking and downloading of what was missing from those disks but previously on my partition, I now had my system right here I wanted it, and still do. I have been knocking on wood and throwing salt over my shoulder every day since in hopes that I am finally past the crossroads of that debacle and will not be turning back any time soon.
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