Have you checked Win World ? There are IBM branded DOS and Windows 3.1. As far as a restore CD with IBM branded DOS and Win 3.1 doubt that existed because they both came on Floppies back in the day.
After Win 3.1 IBM focused only on OS/2 and Warp AFAIK . That is all I know and doubt IBM branded Win3.1 would have much different than any OEM as far as "Goodies" but never know...

CD, floppies, disk image whatever I don't care as long as I can restore it to "stock"
and it seems that the system came with WfW/DOS6.3 initially - the win95 setup I found in it was installed by the previous owner

branding/software is nice to have now for historical reasons, the win95 restore is full of it

Horun wrote on 2021-08-19, 01:59:

Have you checked Win World ? There are IBM branded DOS and Windows 3.1. As far as a restore CD with IBM branded DOS and Win 3.1 doubt that existed because they both came on Floppies back in the day.
After Win 3.1 IBM focused only on OS/2 and Warp AFAIK . That is all I know and doubt IBM branded Win3.1 would have much different than any OEM as far as "Goodies" but never know...

MS Dos 6.22 and Windows for Workgroups 3.11 were bundled together on CDRom in the mid '90s for white box systems.

On some IBM systems you had the option of Win95 or OS/2 v3 Warp on first start up. The prospective owner could select one or the other but not both. Then thew setup routine would install whatever th new owner had selected.

I've got this:

Looks as if it may have been a diskette only install package for Greece / Turkey - http://ps-2.kev009.com/pcpartnerinfo/ctstips/4dd2.htm

thanks everybody!
it seems I have located the correct CD: https://archive.org/details/AptivaEXPLORECD
it has a misleading name of "Multimedia Exploration CD" 🤣

according to description:
Disk contents: Dos 6.3 + Windows 3.11. Automatic installation of Sound Blaster 16, not MWAVE and OS/2 Warp 3
which is exactly what my system had so I ma hopeful this will work just fine
will update the thread once installed , probably tomorrow

well, I have no idea how to use the recovery CD 🤣 🤣 🤣
there is not a boot disk that accompanies it , the cd image is not bootable and there is no boot-image in the files...

I tried having the CD in the drive while booting but it is not getting picked up - cd does not access at all so there must be some other way that I do not know about...
any ideas?!

keropi wrote on 2021-08-19, 17:00:

well, I have no idea how to use the recovery CD LOL LOL LOL there is not a boot disk that accompanies it , the cd image is not b […]
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well, I have no idea how to use the recovery CD 🤣 🤣 🤣
there is not a boot disk that accompanies it , the cd image is not bootable and there is no boot-image in the files...

I tried having the CD in the drive while booting but it is not getting picked up - cd does not access at all so there must be some other way that I do not know about...
any ideas?!

The little booklet the came with mine said make a recover boot disk from the CD. Possibly an image file on there somewhere?

Caluser2000 wrote on 2021-08-19, 18:59:

The little booklet the came with mine said make a recover boot disk from the CD. Possibly an image file on there somewhere?

sadly no for this older restore cd
the win95 one I used had a floppy image in the /restore/ directory so it was easy to use it
but this one has nothing , all I could do was install PC-DOS6.3 since there is a SETUP.COM inside the /DOS63/ directory...
it would not surprise me if a boot disk exists but it's not inside the CD as an image....

The process seems basic enough...

http://ps-2.kev009.com/pcpartnerinfo/ctstips/c52a.htm

...so perhaps its a matter of having the right recovery / exploration CD for your model / region. These were all I could see on Wayback, though nothing specific for 2144-120

https://archive.org/details/aptiva-2168-recovery

https://archive.org/search.php?query=aptiva+2144

PC Hoarder Patrol wrote on 2021-08-19, 20:57:

The process seems basic enough... […]
Show full quote

The process seems basic enough...

http://ps-2.kev009.com/pcpartnerinfo/ctstips/c52a.htm

...so perhaps its a matter of having the right recovery / exploration CD for your model / region. These were all I could see on Wayback, though nothing specific for 2144-120

https://archive.org/details/aptiva-2168-recovery

https://archive.org/search.php?query=aptiva+2144

this does not apply to the wfw/dos/os2 recovery cds ...
there is no boot disk image to use in these cdroms and ofcourse the win95-recovery floppy does not work with the version in question

keropi wrote on 2021-08-19, 21:28:

this does not apply to the wfw/dos/os2 recovery cds ...
there is no boot disk image to use in these cdroms and ofcourse the win95-recovery floppy does not work with the version in question

In PS1DSK2.ZIP is a Recovery folder with a Recovery.img and Loaddsfk.exe (IBM version of Disk Factory), it made an bootable floppy disk that I imaged and attached.
Use Winimage to make a 1.44Mb bootable floppy (and it has IDE/ATAPI CDrom support using IBMIDECD.sys). Not sure if it will help but cannot hurt 😀 at least you can try it.
Also DSK4 has Windows in standard folder layout. You might be able to just PKUNZIP it to C: using -d option. DSK3 is the same DOS6.3 as in root afaik...
Also DSK13 has PS1Tools. The other DSK# zips each contain an add-on to windows, including Faxworks, Winworks, etc.

That is as far as I got in 15 mins of looking thru that CD archive...Got to go check on my 85 year mom but will be back.
If you get it working we can write up a 'how to' text about what you did....

Horun wrote on 2021-08-20, 00:29:

In PS1DSK2.ZIP is a Recovery folder with a Recovery.img and Loaddsfk.exe (IBM version of Disk Factory), it made an bootable flop […]
Show full quote

In PS1DSK2.ZIP is a Recovery folder with a Recovery.img and Loaddsfk.exe (IBM version of Disk Factory), it made an bootable floppy disk that I imaged and attached.
Use Winimage to make a 1.44Mb bootable floppy (and it has IDE/ATAPI CDrom support using IBMIDECD.sys). Not sure if it will help but cannot hurt 😀 at least you can try it.
Also DSK4 has Windows in standard folder layout. You might be able to just PKUNZIP it to C: using -d option. DSK3 is the same DOS6.3 as in root afaik...
Also DSK13 has PS1Tools. The other DSK# zips each contain an add-on to windows, including Faxworks, Winworks, etc.

That is as far as I got in 15 mins of looking thru that CD archive...Got to go check on my 85 year mom but will be back.
If you get it working we can write up a 'how to' text about what you did....

AMAZING!
this worked just fine! the solution was zipped all along - thanks for taking the time to look this up! (just a sidenote, in win95 recovery CDs the zips are password protected, luckily this was not the case here!)
There is no real need for a guide, you boot from floppy and follow the instructions, the process is automatic:

thanks again Horun! 😀

keropi wrote on 2021-08-20, 08:08:

AMAZING! this worked just fine! the solution was zipped all along - thanks for taking the time to look this up! (just a sidenote […]
Show full quote

AMAZING!
this worked just fine! the solution was zipped all along - thanks for taking the time to look this up! (just a sidenote, in win95 recovery CDs the zips are password protected, luckily this was not the case here!)
There is no real need for a guide, you boot from floppy and follow the instructions, the process is automatic:

thanks again Horun! 😀

Great that it works ! Looks good. Am saving the ISO and link to this topic for future reference 😀

Excellent stuff guys.

Caluser2000 wrote on 2021-08-21, 00:35:

Excellent stuff guys.

Your hint about the Win95 CD having a boot disk image on it and PC Hoarder's link to similar deserve lots of credit.
Keropi found the good CD to begin with and was an excellent find !
Good team work !

that's what I like about VOGONS 😀

there are 3 possible choices of Aptiva Restore CDs with wfw/dos6.3 :

1. https://archive.org/details/AptivaEXPLORECD
2. https://archive.org/details/BetaArchive_PC_OS … ecovery_Archive -> IBM Aptiva Multimedia Exploration CD (1995-03-29)
3. https://archive.org/details/BetaArchive_PC_OS … ecovery_Archive -> IBM Aptiva Multimedia Exploration CD (1994-07-14)

all worked for my system BUT the one with no critical errors was the 1994 3rd option
I have not found any Recovery CD that also has OS/2 installation in it

the 1st one complained about the IDE controller once 3.11 was loaded (so it should be for some other motherboard)
the 2nd one complained about not being an intel system when the 3.11 power manager was loading
and the 3rd one had no issues at all

ALL 3 displayed a "system.ini soundblaster midi port error" on 3.11 boot though
this was easily fixed by installing the latest SB16 drivers from creative: https://support.creative.com/downloads/downlo … nDownloadId=273 (sbbasic.exe) which is something one should do anyways

It is funny how we now search for OS branding and "useless apps" when back in the day they were the first things to delete on your brand new computer 🤣 🤣 🤣

Would it be possible to do this without a functioning CD-ROM?
Sadly the CD-ROM on my 2144 machine does not seem to be functioning ..

maybe, i got an aptiva 2168 and the zips from the post keropi did are inside a HDD folder
and there is also a windows 3.11 application to run a restore, i restored back to new the HDD some years ago and the machine did not even have a CD-rom