My experiences with Vista on my T60

[CarrerCrytharis]

So I downloaded a free copy of Windows Vista, Business Edition (32-bit) from my university's student MSDNAA program. I decided to try it out on my T60. I'm planning to change back to XP soon, so I don't have a really in-depth analysis or anything, but I thought I'd comment on a few things I noticed.

--Without Lenovo drivers, most of the custom function keys on the keyboard don't work, as is to be expected. Neither do the sound buttons, which is weird -- they work fine in RC2 on my Dell. The Bluetooth button (F5) and the ThinkLight button do work, actually, as well as the brightness controls, the forward/back keys, and the media controls. The radio switch on the front edge has no effect, pretty much as one would expect.

--Lenovo has released UltraNav drivers for Vista, with pretty much the same functionality as the XP version. A weird black square shows up around the mouse pointer when using the touchpoint's scroll feature.

--Vista is decently swift on my machine. Aero Glass runs pretty well, too -- in general, although the machine has taken time to boot up when I've installed new drivers or software, it never feels sluggish.

--Battery life is horrible. It might be because Lenovo hasn't released the ThinkVantage power management software for Vista yet, but the batteries (I use a 9-cell and an UltraBay battery) were half-depleted (around 50 percent) after about 2 hours. Running on XP, I usually get a total of 6 to 7 hours of battery life. This is the main reason why I want to change back to XP.

Apart from that, Vista is really nice to look at -- also, the interface is a lot more intuitive in some places (although I think the wireless networking interface feels obfuscated). Most of the software I use seemed to work fine, too. I might switch back some day, if Lenovo releases power management software capable of boosting battery life enough to make it more mobile.

Note: if this fits better in another forum, I suppose one of the mods should move it.

[agarza]

Lenovo sooner or later would have to design software to achieve maximum performance on each consumer Thinkpad.

I'm eager to test Vista RTM 6.0000 in my T42p, I'll wait till the end of the year to get a view on how the system has evolved from the first or second beta Longhorn I tried out about 2½ years ago. I installed it on a T30 machine and it felt sluggish. Aero was not implemented yet.

I don't think MS want us to have a long life battery with such a nice features on the new Windows. They should emphasize more on security and more features without sacrificing performance or asking a very powerful machine