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Lenovo Staff
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The older ThinkPads, such as the X201, has a blue ThinkVantage button at the top of the keyboard where if you depress it, the user can access the system and configure it.

I recently bought a T430, which does not have such a button; instead, it has a black button which does not appear to work like the old.

How can I restore my laptop to factory default?


The ThinkPad button has undergone several transformations throughout its history, where it was originally grey, then blue.


Now, ThinkVantage Power Manger does not support ThinkPad anymore but only desktop system.


Machines older than T420 are still able to have the Power Manager tool.


This is just extra information.

The steps below is for machines older than X201 for the button to work when pressed.


  • If you have the original Lenovo factory operating system installed on your T430, press the F11 button while the first boot screen in displayed ("ThinkPad"). That takes you to the recovery menu and will take about a minute to load. 

  • Alternatively, press <Enter> at the boot screen and it will take you to the system options menu (BIOS menu, recovery menu, etc) for you to do some configuration at the button.

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The Think Vantage applications for my t430 do not include the power manager utility. From this discusion, it appears that it is no longer available? The so called power manager driver is installed manually - the system update utility does not install it. Is this correct?

From reading the descriptions of PM, it appear that the battery lasts longer if charge level maintained roughly between 40-70%, but there is no longer a setting in power management that enables this automatically?