x61s 7669-29G vs 7669-27G

[akre2]

on Lenovo's site, the details for these 2 models look identical, yet there is a significat price difference between them. Can anyone help me identify what's different?
corresponding part numbers are
7669-29G -- UK429xx
7669-27G -- UK427xx

[bill bolton]

Can anyone help me identify what's different?
corresponding part numbers are
7669-29G -- UK429xx
7669-27G -- UK427xx

7669-29G
L7300(1.4GHz), 1GB RAM, 120GB 5400rpm HD, 12.1in 1024x768 LCD, Intel X3100, Intel 802.11abg wireless, Bluetooth, Modem, 1Gb Ethernet, Secure chip, Fingerprint reader, 4c Li-Ion, WinXP Pro

7669-27G
L7300(1.4GHz), 1GB RAM, 120GB 5400rpm HD, 12.1in 1024x768 LCD, Intel X3100, Intel 802.11abg wireless, Bluetooth, Modem, 1Gb Ethernet, Secure chip, Fingerprint reader, 4c Li-Ion, WinVista Business 32

Cheers,

Bill B.

[bergje]

I have got the 7669-27G with the windows vista business 32 (since a week) and i gotta say it's ridiculous... It came pre-installed with other bloatware for a total amount of 30,5 Gb of the 120 Gb available. So effectively you lose about a quarter of your hd-space. As you get no real vista install disks (you can order the anytime upgrade disk though) it will be somewhat of a pain to strip it down.

As for the supposed free downgrade from vista to xp-prof. I called the lenovo center and in order to get a set of recovery discs for xp-prof you have to (in europe at least) pay about 60 euro. So much for a 'free' downgrade... You could theoretically call Microsoft but considering this is an OEM version they'll be somewhat difficult about it. I eventually got a hold of a microsoft employee which told me that if i could get an xp-prof install disc they would downgrade my registration code (found on the bottom of the laptop) for an xp key and that i could switch back when ever i wanted but i would again have to call microsoft (and each time you want to install vista afterwards to active the OS).

I eventually tossed of Vista and installed an XP-prof i still had and a clean install of XP-prof SP2 with all critical updates up to date took about 5-6 Gb... Which if you value disc-space is a lot less then vista imho.

So you decide which is the best choice . This is just some background information for the case where Vista is the cheapest option.

Regards

[Jackboot]

My "custom restore" (factory restore with the option to not install the "bloatware") with vista32 premium is 13GB. I am getting this figure by simply selecting all of my HD contents except for my personal data files folder. As a result this includes all of my extra program files I have installed. A fresh "custom restore" of vista32 is probably around 6-8GB. I am sure someone here can confirm.

All this talk about Vista = bloat is not accurate at all IMO. Vista is a far superior OS to XP in my experience.

[bergje]

I'm very curious on how you did a factory recovery without the bloatware... I also created recovery disks and did reinstall them to see if there was an option to install without bloatware. But as far as i could check you only got two options to agree with. One was the vista EULA and the other was something from Lenovo which you could either agree to (to be able to use the computer) or not and then it would not install... (perhaps i'm mistaking there).

Either way i'm not skilled in the way of Vista so you can very well be right about the install size of a fresh install. I was just stating that since imho (as far as i was able to find out) you couldn't do a 'clean' install of vista and the factory recovery cd's were 30 Gb after installation, I would opt for XP...

Please let us know how you did a factory install without the bloatware...

Regards

[ryengineer]

snip.....Please let us know how you did a factory install without the bloatware......snip

Perform "Custom Factory Restore" by following:

a. Turn off your machine.
b. Power it up and carefully observe the display. Look for the logo screen. At any time, while the logo screen is onscreen, press Thinkvantage Blue Button or F11.
c. Once Rescue and Recovery Predesktop area fully initiates, you'll see many option on the top and left side of your screen.
d. Under "Rescue and Restore" press "Restore your system".

At some point you'll be presented with custom restore option.

The rest of the process is self explanatory.

Please do make sure you have the lastest version of Thinkvantage Rescue and Recovery installed.

Also, this option doesn't appear during CD/DVD installation of factory contents.

[bergje]

thanks for explaining... when i reinstall vista i'll use that option. I also see why i wasn't able to find it... i only tried recovery from the dvd's to check if they were created succesfully. To bad that option isn't available from the dvd's.... in that case i might have been running vista for a bit. As for now i'm quite happy with my dual-boot XP/Ubuntu configuration and will continue to use that for some time.

Regards - Ronald