I have an idea of what it is. I think it might be left over data from the non working recovery app install.
Let's try this to see if it works...
Click your menu button and go to manage apps. From there select the recovery app. Now before uninstalling it, hit the
clear data button and then uninstall it and reboot. Install recovery from
here and see if it works.
You may have tried this already too, but I figured I mention it anyways since people usually uninstall apps without clearing data first.