Successfully Installed Windows 7 Ultimate 32 bit on T42P 2373 HTU

Question

Hi Fellow Forum Members,
I didn't see this topic, so thought I would post my experiences.
I have successfully installed Windows 7 Ultimate 32 bit on my T42P 2373-HTU. It was pretty easy. I did NOT have these problems which were mentioned elsewhere on the internet:
Display flickering - mentioned sometimes regarding the ATI video card
Wireless adapter problems - mentioned due to the Intel wireless 2100 3b adapter
It was very painless. Here are the steps I followed:
Bought a new hard drive (made sure to get PATA and not SATA). I bought this model from Amazon for $95, Western Digital Scorpio Blue PATA 5400 RPM 8 MB Cache Bulk/OEM Notebook Hard Drive WD3200BEVE . Note: I don't think the hard drive protection system works with non-IBM/Lenovo hard drives. So don't drop it.
Swapped out the old hard drive for the new one. Note 1: I did not do any formatting on the new drive, so I'm not sure how/if it was formatted. The Windows 7 installer did not ask me any questions about formatting the hard drive.  Note 2: My new hard drive did not come with a cover and when I put it into the main hard drive bay of the T42P, the T42P BIOS did not find the hard drive. I moved the hard drive cover from the old hard drive and put it on the new one and then the BIOS found my new hard drive without any problems. To check if you have this problem, hit F1 when starting up and enter the BIOS. Check the startup and if the hard drive is found, you will see a description for it. So it will say something like HDD:0 WD2345HWTK. If it just says HDD:0 and is blank after that, it did not find the hard drive. You can check this before you swap out the hard drive.
Installed Windows 7 (custom install as it was not an upgrade). Note: The computer reboots a couple of times. It asks after the first reboot (did not ask after the 2nd or I didn't see the question) if you want to boot from the CD/DVD drive. I tried to hit a key which would mean yes, but am not sure this was fast enough. Obviously if one boot option does not work for you, try the other.
After finishing the install, I ran Windows Update. There are several drivers that it finds, including the ATI video driver and the Intel wireless adapter driver. You have to reboot after this for the changes to take effect. Note: These are optional updates according to Windows Update, but maybe not to you
I then downloaded Lenovo ThinkVantage System Update 4. Despite not having an IBM/Lenovo hard drive, this installed and ran fine. It recognized my Thinkpad model and type. It then let me install drivers for things like the volume buttons above the keyboard, etc.
Moved my data. I put my old hard drive into a hard drive adapter and then put it in where the CD/DVD drive was. I then copied over all my old files by hand.
That's it. I was hope this was helpful for you. I was very impressed that the System Update software would install all the drivers I needed to get to the Thinkpad specific features to work.
Systems I use: T42P, T61P, Y510, A600

Answer 1

Just want to give an update. It's been about 1 week and I've had no problems. Signing in and out of Win 7 is very fast. Much better than with XP. Even though I have a slower hard drive with Windows 7 (5400 RPM) vs Windows XP (7200 RPM), Windows 7 is faster. Startup time is about the same, but shutdown is a lot faster, just like signing and out and logging in and out.
Wireless LAN (WLAN) configuration was painless and has worked well. It automatically reconnects when I boot and does not drop my connection when i stay logged in but switch users (this happened to me on XP with the IBM Access software).
It has been well worth the upgrade so far.
Systems I use: T42P, T61P, Y510, A600