Speeding up a brand new T61 with XP

[mouseclick]

Hey, folks. I'm the proud owner of a brand new T61 with XP. Specs are in the signature. I bought the Thinkpad to replace a Toshiba Satellite (2.8 GHz Pentium 4, XP Pro SP2, 448 MB RAM, 15.4") after a couple of incidents that made me doubt the continued reliability of my well-loved but beaten-up Toshiba.

The only things I've loaded onto the Thinkpad myself are Office 2007 and the corporate edition of Symantec that my school offers. There are a lot of posts about how to improve this or that with on XP, but I'm wondering if some of the more tech-savvy people here could help me sort it all out.

So here are my questions:

1) I barely understand what the ThinkVantage suite of applications does. I don't anticipate using it much, but on the off chance that I will in the future, I don't want to get rid of it entirely.

a. Is there any way to turn off Client Security Solution? Every time I login the "Verify Identity" screen pops up to ask for my password. This is really annoying, and I want to make that stop. I've already disabled the Password Manager. What would happen if I unlocked and disabled the stuff in Enhanced Security?

b. What exactly does Access Connections do? Why does it want to create profiles every time I plug my laptop into the Internet with an Ethernet cord after going to school or coming back home? My Toshiba just connects to the Internet without all this naming connections stuff.

2) My Thinkpad seems... slow. When I boot up and click my screen name to login, it takes a couple of seconds before the Thinkpad shows the "welcome/Loading your personal settings..." screen. My Toshiba starts logging in right away. How to do I speed up my Thinkpad?

If anyone could help me with these issues, or even give me advice for Thinkpad newbies, I'd greatly appreciate it.

[ryengineer]

1. List of what each ThinkVantage product does?.

a. Client Security Solution is performing it's function, you can safely uninstall it if you don't like it and fingerprint reader is independent of CSS.

b. See #1.

If you create profiles for your school and home then it won't ask you to create a new profile anymore unless you go to a new place for instance a coffee shop and connect to internet there.

2. Perform Custom Factory Restore to remove the applications you don't plan on using.

[Truthfinder]

I beleive you can also go into the bios (F1) on boot up and disable the on board security chip. It's a good thing to have if you are concerned about the teft of your ThinkPad, however, it certainly slows thing down, mainly when booting up your unit.

Access Connections can be uninstalled. I have found that the Windows Net connect does a fine job on its own, and actually give MY ThinkPad a faster connection to my wireless router.

Keep in mind that the above has made my experience with the T60 better. You may or may not gain the same possitive results.

Hope this sheds some light on at leat a couple of your questions.

Truthfinder