Windows 7 on X32

[T39andcounting]

Hi,
I've just installed Windows 7 on my ThinkPad X32. It's working OK... as fast as Windows XP. Still getting used to the menus, but have a couple of issues/questions:

Windows shows the graphics as a "Generic Non-PnP Monitor on Standard VGA Graphics Adapter" and won't let me use dual screens when I've got an external monitor connected. The external monitor just mirrors what's on the internal display. I assume this is because the video driver is incorrect. Does anyone know of a working driver for this? Or if the dual display menus are hidden, where are they?!

Sound buttons don't control the windows volume, so it's difficult to tell when it's muted and when I'm changing the sound, what the volume is.

Are there copies of access connections, etc for Windows 7?

Thanks!

[T39andcounting]

Ok, so I've sorted the easy ones... downloaded the XP/vista apps from lenovo to get the volume and access connections working. But still can't get dual monitors using the default graphics driver Windows has assigned. Anyone else managed to fix this?

[rfburns]

Sorry I can't help you, at least not yet. I want to install Win7 on my x32 but worry more about it recognizing the wireless card. (I tried Win7 the day the beta first came out on a a31 and gave up quick on trying to get it to see the wifi card. I presume that you got past this hurdle. If so, I'll try the RC on the x32.
Thanks!

[dsvochak]

I had similar issues on my T41 which were easily resolved.

For video try the Lenovo XP driver. Download and extract the driver. It's possible you will get an error message when extracting the files that "This program may not have installed correctly." If you do, pick "Reinstall with recommended settings". Don't try to run Setup for the driver.

Open Device Manager and select “Display Adaptor-->Standard VGA”, right click and select update driver. Hit “browse for driver” and get the drop down box. Navigate to where the driver was extracted (in my case it was “C:\DRIVERS\WIN\DISPLAY\Driver\2KXP_INF”). If you’ve got the right folder it should find the .inf file and install the driver. Device Manager is now correctly showing the adaptor on my machine as "ATI Mobility Radeon 7500". After I installed the video driver, Windows 7 update found an optional update for "Lenovo--Thinkpad Display".

The Lenovo XP driver for my wireless card (Intel 220bg) installs and runs fine. I'd say it's worth trying.

[T39andcounting]

Thanks dsvochak, that's go the graphics working correctly... I can dual screen!

rfburns: Everything works OK that I've tried... wifi and bluetooth are both recognized (I'm using the original built in cards), and seems to work fine. I've not installed too many apps, as I use it mainly for web surfing, but it's as fast as WinXP was. Very cool to get it working on such old hardware!

[rfburns]

Thanks dsvochak & T39andcounting,
With this information, I think I'll start another Win7 installation on my x32.
Thanks again!

[dickchailey]

Installs and runs fine on X31, I put in a spare HD to allow a quick return to XP if I gave up. Same issues - don't install video and sound drivers from the setup program just point to the inf file in the driver folder. I used the Atheros XP drivers and wireless is working good. The FnF5 is only controlling BT on/off although the OSD is only showing wireless but not switching! Perhaps the new OSD drivers promised will solve that one.
The media streaming is good - my Sony TV found the X31 straight away and played MP3 files from the laptop. One strange thing - the Infrared port is disabled in BIOS but is found and installed in Win7!
Cost will be a big issue next year - bet the Ultimate edition will cost an A&L.

[dsvochak]

don't install video and sound drivers from the setup program just point to the inf file in the driver folder

There have been a few threads about driver issues on older machines with Vista. I've never tried Vista on my T41, but I wonder whether the issues that came up were related to trying to run the setup program instead of pointing to the inf file.

On the whole, I'm impressed with Windows 7. As you said, let's hope it isn't an arm & leg when released.

[pae77]

Microsoft is very smart. They know they've got a good thing going here with W7 and they've already got me hooked on it so I'll have to buy it (or a new PC w. it) before the RC expires.

[T39andcounting]

Microsoft is very smart. They know they've got a good thing going here with W7 and they've already got me hooked on it so I'll have to buy it (or a new PC w. it) before the RC expires.

not sure i'd say i'm hooked. i'm glad it runs on older hardware, and i'm not opposed to buying a new computer with it on like I was with Vista, but I haven't seen any compelling reason to upgrade to it. although i don't have it installed on my main laptop, so maybe i'm not using it enough.

what's the "killer app" for you?

[guanghua19]

Installed Windows 7 in one of my two X32s. I have to admit Windows 7 is really impressive. It runs much better and smoother than vista on a T61. Plan to upgrade all my other xp computers after the official release.

[pianowizard]

not sure i'd say i'm hooked. i'm glad it runs on older hardware, and i'm not opposed to buying a new computer with it on like I was with Vista, but I haven't seen any compelling reason to upgrade to it.

There's one Windows 7 feature that I've gotten hooked on. I discovered it by accident. I was working on an unmaximized Internet Explorer window; when I dragged the top of the browser to the top of the screen, the browser automatically expanded itself to the bottom of the screen, i.e. the browser now occupied the entire height of the screen while its width remained unchanged. Then I tried to move the browser around and realized that I could only move it sideways, not vertically. I quickly realized that this feature made it easier to arrange two or more windows side by side! Later, I discovered that the same thing could be achieved by double-clicking on the very top of the browser (i.e. at the point where the mouse pointer becomes a double arrow), and that this features works for Windows Explorer windows as well.

[T39andcounting]

I must admit I've just downgraded my X32 back to WinXP. Windows 7 was good, but I found a fair few programs just weren't quite compatible, (what you'd expect from a RC I guess!). Definitely not put off upgrading to Win7 in the future, but at the moment, it doesn't have enough going for it to make it worth the hassle. Will probably wait until a few months after the official release before I take the plunge.

[pae77]

I've got everything I want to run on it running (except Daemon Tools Lite, which I understand there is a work around for, but I've found another free alternative to use for now). Even apps with unsigned drivers like RMClock and PeerGuardian are running great with "self signed" drivers in "test mode." There are a few apps like various registry cleaners and tweaking tools that I wouldn't attempt to run on W7, but then, it doesn't seem to need such things, at least so far. I'm sure such tools will be available shortly anyway.

There is no one killer app for me contained within the OS, however. It's simply the overall user experience that it provides that is the killer app for me. I found Vista to be extremely sluggish, inconsistent, unstable on my T61p. I never knew which icons were going to show up in my system tray under Vista and would frequently have to log off and on to get some of them to show up, for example.

However, I now realize my Vista experience probably would have been a lot better if I had done a clean install like I did with W7, instead of using the factory preload.

In any case, I'm really spoiled by how fast and smooth my machine feels and runs under W7 and that is the main thing I would just hate to give up. Plus I do really like W7's GUI and the general improvement in overall "usability" and stability of everything. Everything is just so refined and well thought out, imo.

Oh, and I do really also like the "Library" feature a lot. I initially was skeptical about it but it turns out to be really useful, especially if you keep a lot of stuff on external or network drives.

Really, there's no going back for me. W7 brings the same excitement back to computing for me that XP did when it was first introduced.

[miketoro]

I must admit I've just downgraded my X32 back to WinXP. Windows 7 was good, but I found a fair few programs just weren't quite compatible, (what you'd expect from a RC I guess!). Definitely not put off upgrading to Win7 in the future, but at the moment, it doesn't have enough going for it to make it worth the hassle. Will probably wait until a few months after the official release before I take the plunge.

These are my feelings exactly. I put it on my T43, used it for a few days, but after the newness wore off, it didn't feel as intuitive or faster than my lite version of XP. It doesn't have any whiz-bang features either. I swapped the drive with my X30, which surprisingly worked, so Win7 is still on one of my machines, but until I buy a new computer with Win7 installed, I can wait.

On a side note, it kills me that they got rid of the classic start menu. What a wankish thing to do ...

[pieroinkofu]

Hi

I just installed windows 7 on my X32, but I have some problems with the Wifi.
I can't find an appropriate driver for the "Wireless Intermediate Driver".

I can't find a driver for the blue tooth too.

I installed the drivers I founded for the X32 on Lenovo website, but these problems still occures...

Thanks a lot for your help!


Pierre

[ifel]

Hello X32 Fans.

Recently, I decided to install Windows 7 on my X32. Here is my success story (huh, Thanks God, it's really __success__ story ). Actually, it's step by step manual, hope it will help to someone.

What do I have:
1. IBM x32. Model number: 2672-D25. I believe it's important, as your hardware (if you have another model of course) can be different.
2. Bluetooth USB adapter. As my x32 doesn't have embedded one, but I have some BT peripherals, I bought USB bluetooth adapter. My Microsoft mouse did not work on XP till I installed BlueSoleil stack, but I had issues with it (sometimes it won't to wake up from sleep/hibernate, or did that slowly). How it works now - read below.
3. Peripherals - BT Microsoft Notebook Mouse 5000, BT Plantronics discovery 650 hands free (I use it with Skype), HTC Magician communicator, Digital camera (Canon PowerShot SX110 IS). As you probably understand, one of my requirement was - all of this MUST be working under new OS.
4. Desktop computer I used for backup purposes and ADSL modem (in this case I needed it as DHCP server).

So, let's do it.
1. 1st step, was backup everything, in case if something is going wrong. I did 2 backups. 1st one was backup of all sensetive data as files plus I exported connections from Access connection manager, I wanted to do the same with Power manager, however, unfortunately, Power manager does not allow to export its schemas . The second backup I performed, was a drive image. I did it using Acronis True Image (I had it on Reanimator live CD, it has russian interface, but I believe, it's possible to find Acronis standalone live CD (or a rescue live CD with Acronis) with English interface, just I like that CD, it helped me out to reanimate many dead computers). To do this, I shared a folder on my desktop with write permissions, booted up IBM with that live CD, ran Acronis, it got IP settings from DHCP server, I marked the whole drive, pointed it to desktop share as backup destination and voila, in 20 minutes I got entire disk backup with my old XP installation.
2. Windows install. Well, everything was usual - disk partitioning, next, next, next... nothing special. After install complete, I got in, using created during installation user account, enabled Administrator account, relogin as Administrator, and downgraded my user account down to restricted one. All futhers steps will be done under Administrator account. I prefer to work under restricted account due to security reasons and have separate administrator account for admin purposes.
3. I wasn't surprised too much, when I found that 1/3 of devices were not detected. But I had a wire network adapter working, so will fight for the rest . First of all, I decided to install windows updates. There were standard updates set, however, when I pressed "Check for updates" link in the Control Panel, oh my, Windows found drivers for almost ALL hardware I have. I marked all items (but Language packs) and installed them. After reboot, I had almost all embedded HW working, but Display adapter.
4. Display adapter is really pain in the throat for this model under Windows 7 as there is no official support of Radeon 7000 for Windows 7. However, I found compatible one in shakeyplace's post to forum thread here: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/For ... 3c81324ab7. If you want just download it, here is direct link: http://rapidshare.com/files/243741998/R ... _XDDM_.zip. If the file has been deleted from rapidshare, email me, I will upload it somewhere to allow you to download it.
5. As 5th step, I installed Lenovo System Update http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... MIGR-73695. It found and installed: ThinkPad Hotkey features setup, ThinkPad Power manager, ThinkPad Power management driver, Lenovo System interface driver, ThinkPad TrackPoint driver. In result, I got Power manager installed, some drivers updated and OSD working. So when I press "Light" combination (Fn+PgUp), it shows light icon at the bottom and it gets dissapeared in couple seconds, the same as it was under Windows XP. Wonderful.
6. Install ThinkVantage Access Connections for Windows 7 - Notebooks. I downloaded it here: http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... 73682.html, installed, imported all my connections, and everything works! Cool.
7. At this moment, I have all devices recognized, Connections established and managed, Power controlled. Let's try to connect peripherals. I started connecting my devices one by one, windows recognized them, downloaded drivers and installed them. I was surprised that my mouse started working, without any additional dancings around. Excellent. Of course, the rest devices work fine too.

Here is it. All devices running properly, notebook allows to be undocked, sleep and hibernate works, well..... everything works.
It's time to install needed software and start configuring my user profile.
I wrote this post on my X32 running Windows 7.
Wish you good luck with installation and to get the same success story I got. If someone needs a screen shot with Device maneger opened, let me know, I will post it.

[oxygen14]

Thanks for this success story. I installed Windows 7 on my X32 after a Linux update crash. The ATI Radeon Mobility driver is the key to success (unlike BSOD's with other driver for W2K/XP from IBM/Lenovo). The file was still available on rapidshare, and I downloaded it to my NAS first.

[ParatoOptimal]

7-Ultimate on X31 is fine. Let 7 update drivers which got all the Lenovo drivers I needed. I manually pointed to the 7500 video driver. I haven't done anything manual for the sound drivers. 7 and Lenovo seem to have done that automatically. Well, I get sound. Logitech USB mice and Dell BT mouse where setup by 7 without requiring any discs. Wireless USB dongles, wireless PCMCIA card and internal IBM/Lenovo cards were all installed automatically.

I'm also dual booting 7-Ultimate and Ubuntu on my X60s.