Before
I go and install Vista on my borrowed
Toshiba M400 I wanted to be sure that I could get it back to factory
defaults before I hand it back. To this end I thought I would create a
set of recovery DVDs for the M400 before I started.
This
process is very easy. There is an icon on the desktop:
Clicking
this launches a nice simple wizard that lets you select your media type (CD or
DVD). You just put the first disc in and click Burn. When each disc
completes it is verified, then you are prompted to insert the next disc.
Now if you
ever create recovery media I strongly suggest you test that you can boot off it.
To this end I changed the boot order in the BIOS and put the first disc
in. It booted into Windows. I then used the F12 method to activate
the boot menu and selected CD. No dice – did not even light up the
activity light on the drive. Nothing wrong with the media – I could
boot another machine off it. The problem is actually with the M400.
It would seem that you can’t boot off (at least) some external USB optical
drives. I tried it with two different drives and could not get it boot
off either optical drive.
It was at
this point that I tried picked up the manual and discovered the other method to
restore factory defaults… The recovery files are already on the
disc in a hidden partition. To access this you boot the device while
holding down zero (0). The machine will boot off the hidden partition and
you can restore the M400 to factory defaults. Very cool.
Safe in the
knowledge that I could get it back – I rebooted into Windows, put the
Vista DVD in (can’t boot off it – remember) and started off the
install. Stay Tuned.