Thinkpads Forum

Morning folks, getting ready to build my first SSD for my T60 and was wondering if anyone is happy with XP on a T60? or is Vista or 7 still the way to go? I guess Vista is more cost effective since I have to go get a copy of either should I leave XP.

Thanks burns

7 would be my best advice!
Vista is nearly good as 7 it is (with the latest service pack).

T60 can handle them both very good no matter if they're on a HDD or SSD (though booting on SSD is much more fast)

By my opinion XP is obsolete and it's pain in the [censored] everytime I try to set it up. So go for 7/Vista. Goodluck

I would strongly recommend against using XP on a ssd, since it is not optimized as well for it as 7 (and to a lesser extent vista). If you're feeling brave you could get a windows 8 upgrade, which is on sale until the end of January, which would run very nicely on it, however if you have a vista COA on your laptop, I would say just go with that, it is supported for several years, and a fully patched version is comparable to windows 7 in terms of performance and reliability.

Vista also lacks TRIM support for the SSD, though.

I have been running XP from a SSD in my T60 for a couple of years, and it has worked well with the Optimizing Utility from the Intel Toolbox. If this gives the same result as native TRIM support from the OS is unknown to me, but I haven't experienced any degradation of performance. That does depends on the use of Intel SSDs, as I am not sure if any other drive manufacturer provides similar tools.

Also note that I reimaged the XP install onto the SSD with Clonezilla, which is not recommended, as the install isn't properly aligned. The SSD was however still such a increase in speed over the old mechanical 7200 drive, that I never considered doing any more about it. Now I am curious to see how Win8 will behave when installed on SSD.

I am using SSD in several T60's, under XP, and have doing this for several years, and without ever having had any difficulties - actually, XP on a SSD in T60's runs very fast and entily stable! (note: I am using Intel SSD's, which I have had nothing but good to say about). So, from my personal experience there is no reason for saying so categorically as some tend to: "At all costs, stay away from SSD's with XP in T60's!" As mentioned, however, notice that the Microsoft Extended Life Support on XP w/SP3 will end in April 2014... so after that date you'll have to either go to Linux or to Vista or Windows 7.

If you're interested e.g. learning more about SSD's in T60's, under XP and Windows 7, then I suggest you review e.g. the threads Adding an SSD to a T60 and Latest Recommendations for SSD replacement to old 60gb HD and SSD choice advice for T60 upgrade and SSD runs slow on my T60 and SSD performance on cloned XP Pro, Samsung 830 256GB... just to mention a few!

Good luck with your soon-to-be SSD for your T60; trust me: You'll be flying once you have the SSD!

Johan

Johan, great information, thanks a bunch

burns

Johan and others, thanks for your good advice on using xp on an SSD. My hardware has yet to arrive but I am planning on using a Crucial M4 128 as a drive and I purchased an Ultrabay SSD to hold the SSD during build. I think I'll use Partition Assistant and migrate my existing OS on to the SSD. Does this all make sense?

thanks in advance
burns