How IBM got on my bad side, the quick and dirty way

So, some time ago, some yutz at IBM decided that it would be a GREAT idea not to give any of its users actual, bona-fide copies of the operating system software on removable physical media. Just about every OTHER company has managed to provide some sort of “rescue CD” of sorts, just in case something really, really goes south on a person’s computer, requiring them to just wipe it all away and start clean again. This is especially important with laptops, as most of them have specialized equipment. IBM ThinkPads are worst of all, with their encryption hardware, fingerprint readers, and other proprietary goodies built into them.

But no. Instead of spending the 20 cents a disc to press some CDs for end users, IBM chose instead to throw all the recovery software onto a hidden partition on the hard drive of the machine itself. Never mind that it’s very likely someone will want to recover from a catastrophic failure caused by a hard drive crash, and if the hard drive is screwed to hell, well then it’s highly unlikely that the recovery partition will be of any use, now will it?

Well, fear not. If you’re a ThinkPad user that happens to be as paranoid as I am about losing the only copy of the recovery software in existence for your laptop, you’re allowed to create one set of IBM recovery software discs, by yourself. Yes, YOU must supply the CDs for burning. Oh, and by the way: the software that makes this happen doesn’t tell you in advance how many CDs you need to burn the entire set… you just gotta keep feeding it CDs until its done. And if you run out, well, too bad. Because you only get one chance. And if you blow that chance, then you get the above message, and are never, ever allowed to burn a set of recovery CDs again.

Well, I tried to burn my set the day I got my ThinkPad. Unfortunately, I was not prepared for the possibility that instead of letting me burn all of this software to one, maybe two DVDs – which the laptop was perfectly capable of doing – the software to create the discs instead would insist on no less than seven CD-Rs. And to my chagrin, I only had three good quality CD-Rs, and a spindle of el-cheapo, free-after-rebate “use once and toss” blanks that shouldn’t be used on anything of real importance.

Well, having committed to burning my one set of recovery discs, I had no choice but to use the el-cheapo media. And they delaminated less than two weeks later.

Annoyed, I finally made sure I had a whole spindle of actual name-brand, decent quality CD-Rs, and attempted to make one more copy… only to be thwarted by the above error message.

My only recourse now, as the friendly IBM tech I spoke with on the phone informed me, is to buy a set of recovery discs directly from IBM, at the cost of $45.

I swear, whoever came up with THIS stupidity should be fired.

Let’s just review this logic, okay? First off, the genius that came up with this scheme was arrogant enough to assume that hard drives never fail. After all, if hard drives never fail, you can always recover from the hard drive, right? Then, this same genius decided that if anyone EVER wants to make more than one copy of a recover software set, then they obviously must be pirating the software. Never mind that this software is so specialized in the drivers and configurations it offers that it only works on a Thinkpad, and nothing else.

Besides, what is to prevent someone from successfully making their one copy, slipping that one copy into another computer, and churning out dozens of duplicate CD-Rs, completely bypassing this stupid security measure?

I love my ThinkPad. I have no complaints with how it works and how it has treated me so far. It has not yet had a catastrophic failure of any kind, but I refuse to leave such possibilities to chance, and expect to be able to recover using CDs if I have to. But this protect-the-software strategy is extremely shortsighted and only punishes legitimate end users who didn’t realize that so much media would be expended on something as mundane as software recovery.

I’m stuck with it now. So Monday, when IBM’s sales office opens, I’ll be calling again and spending $45 to get the CDs which every IBM users should have gotten in the first place, for free, with their laptops. And the ONLY reason I’m biting the bullet on this is because I’m past my return/refund period. And I warn other ThinkPad users: make your recovery discs on the best media you can buy, and guard that one set of discs like gold. You have no other choice.