Whoo, I have a new laptop...

[Harsky]

Currently in Hong Kong for chinese new year... and since I was given a fair amount of lucky money, I decided to get a new laptop to replace my old laptop that I bought last year. So i settled on this:

http://reviews.cnet.com/HP_Pavilion_tx1000...7-32305764.html

Still tinkering about with it but I'm not pleased with the fact that when I turned it on, I was greeted with tons of junk HP installed on it... am I being paranoid in wanting to download Vista and reinstall a fresh copy on it instead of spending a few hours picking out the stuff HP installed? BTW, I'm still new to the whole Vista thing but what's with the thing where if you click on an icon, there's a little checkbox?

 

[FAST6191]

Paranoid about factory installed junk, not at all: quite in fact I suggest everyone reinstalls the OS as the first thing they do with a new machine.

You may come unstuck though as most manufacturers merge junk with the install CDs.

 

[leetdude_007]

All I can tell you is to stay away from Vista for about a half a year.. and that's if you ARE impatient! Security issues everywhere. My university is adding additional layers of 3rd party security (the expensive stuff) for computers with vista in the network.

It's. Just. New. also it has a virgin tcp/ip stack.

 

[Harsky]

Thanks for the suggestions. Looks like I'll reinstall XP. That said, the place I bought it from was uber friendly and let me open the box with the laptop to try it out. But this laptop didn't come with installation CDs because when I turned the laptop on for the first time, it created a recovery space for me to burn onto a DVD-R if I run into trouble. Another thing I'm a bit narked about is the fact that the keyboard layout is in the chinese position and not the UK one so the @ and the " is swapped. Any chances that HP will supply a keypad with the UK lettering on it?

 

[FAST6191]

It often confuses me that cheapo laptops from places like dell come with CDs but companies like HP and Sony (which make media) do not. If you had to burn a CD the chances are there is a "recovery" partition that swipes a bunch of the drive as well so you be best to repartition anyhow (which will wipe any data in the process).

As for the keyboard I remember falling foul of the alt layouts when travelling, you have three options as far as I see it (aside from trying to find replacement keys):
use a USB/PS2 keyboard (if you do not have PS2 port there are USB adaptors),
Get used to it, give it two weeks and you will be used to the new laptop keyboard and the new layout.
Try faking the keyboard in the driver settings and getting used to that, it appears you have already went down this route. There are places that do it (a simple search or two should bring some up) but you might also want to speak to your local computer shop (if you really have to ebay as well) and see if they broke a laptop for parts.

 

[Harsky]

It often confuses me that cheapo laptops from places like dell come with CDs but companies like HP and Sony (which make media) do not. If you had to burn a CD the chances are there is a "recovery" partition that swipes a bunch of the drive as well so you be best to repartition anyhow (which will wipe any data in the process).

As for the keyboard I remember falling foul of the alt layouts when travelling, you have three options as far as I see it (aside from trying to find replacement keys):
use a USB/PS2 keyboard (if you do not have PS2 port there are USB adaptors),
Get used to it, give it two weeks and you will be used to the new laptop keyboard and the new layout.
Try faking the keyboard in the driver settings and getting used to that, it appears you have already went down this route. There are places that do it (a simple search or two should bring some up) but you might also want to speak to your local computer shop (if you really have to ebay as well) and see if they broke a laptop for parts.

That said, I'm worried that when I format it and install XP, it will lose some of the software that allows the touchscreen aspect of it to be used. Also, I think that this laptop is really the latest thing and no UK keyboards are out for it yet. I guess I could just get a couple of stickers and write it down and stick it on the keyboard... but it's going to be hard to configure browsing habits since I have to use the college computers.

 

[Psyfira]

You can swap the keyboard layout without touching drivers in the regional settings of XP (control panel> Regional and language options), maybe Vista does something similar. If you're really bothered by the lettering on the keys can't you just get replacement key tops for it? (laptop keys just pry off of the hinges underneath, but does @ and " really matter when you know they're swapped?)

Your restore disk will probably put all the factory crap right back on it. Just leave it as it is, the preinstalled crap's easy to get rid of. It's a new computer, so just look through installed programs, use google to work out if they're anything useful (hardware progs, etc) and ditch the rubbish.

 

[Harsky]

Thanks for the advice... but I think I hope putting XP on the laptop when it's designed for Vista is a good idea... I keep thinking it's like having a Ferrari... but replacing the mechanics with a Ford....

 

[skullstatue]

Well, you probably should wait to upgrade to Vista. If you use it for school it's probably fine, but if you use it for MP3's, emulation, videos, and games, I can't honestly suggest upgrading. Vista has some bugs that need to be worked out and you can't count on some software working with Windows Vista. Also, if you do anything "naughty" while using Vista you have a much higher likely-hood of getting caught and also, those "naughty" applications, music files, or games might not work with it. It's up to you, but if I were you I'd wait........

 

[FAST6191]

"Designed for vista" really means the specs are at or above the minimum that MS said it would work with nothing else. We have not reached the stage (and doubt we will for a while) where there are vista only drivers.

"I keep thinking it's like having a Ferrari... but replacing the mechanics with a Ford...."

I am not one for car analogies but the performance difference tends to slide the other way i.e. Vista slower and less compatible than XP.

 

[Harsky]

Update since I'm back in the UK and my original plan to put XP on my laptop has kinda gone out the window as there are only 2 drivers for the XP version and I don't think it allows the touchscreen to be used as the the drivers for that and a lot of other drivers is only for the Vista version. So I guess I might as well get the Vista version but my question is, what's the difference between 32 bit and 64 bit?

 

[FAST6191]

32 bit requires 32bit drivers while 64bit requires 64bit drivers (generally that bit more rare and less tested) and can use 64 bit apps (mainly research, maths and server/buisness stuff although a few not especially noteworthy games can make use of it (far cry springs to mind) and a few video programs are making inroads). If you really want a 64bit OS linux is the way to go for now (if only becuase it has been around longer).

As for the drivers I can well understand, dll hell is bad enough for desktops let alone laptops (reason no.2 I did not get a laptop this time around) although I would not expect it to be that bad (try looking for earlier models and using various drivers from them). It could be worse though, I could be messing with linux on a laptop.

 

[Harsky]

I should've mentioned that the laptop I have has an AMD Turion 64X2 processor and 1gb ram with 160gb HDD. Like I said, I COULD just go for the XP route... but that would mean sacrificing the touchscreen aspect which was what sold me on the laptop in the first place.

 

[Mehdi]

that laptop is hot... go for vista. Bugs will be fixed anyways.

 

[FAST6191]

64 bit processors can run a 32 bit OS without issue (I am doing it as we speak).
As for touchscreen check around the tablet PCs as the controllers are frequently the same and some just about run XP (or some proto XP), I agree though that would be a selling point of the machine.

 

[Deleted User]

I've recently (less than two weeks) bought a new macbook pro, so far I'm delighted

 

[GameGeezer]

If your laptop has enough cpu power and memory to run Vista I would install it. I've been running Vista at home from the beta's up to the final version for about 6 months. Most people who report bad experiences with Vista either don't have the right hardware to run it or are basing their opinions on second hand advice. Many of the problems that Vista had were present during it's Beta phases.

If I were a system administrator I would hold off for a while and make sure all my machines could handle it and let security glitches get worked out but I really don't think it has any more security glitches than XP did (that's not saying much) and it's networking capabilities are far superior to XP. As a home user you don't have the same concerns as a business or institution.

On the right machine Vista runs better and faster than windows XP and is much more stable. There are very few programs that are not compatible with Vista at this point. If you are nervous set up the option to run XP and Vista on a dual boot. For the best performance I recommend a clean install of Vista but it runs fine if you are able to update.

Talk to someone you know who is running Vista on a powerful machine and I think they'll give you similar feedback.

 

[Harsky]

Yeah, at the moment, I'm now downloading a torrent of Windows Vista X86 32bit because when I bought the laptop, they didn't throw in a disc. That said, how do I set up the dual boot thing? I think it would be nice to have both Vista and XP just in case.

 

[GameGeezer]

Honestly I'm not sure how you do it. I think it may be an option when you set up Vista and have XP as an existing operating system when you do the set up. For more info google dual boot vista and I'm sure there's plenty of information on the net.

Edit: I read you have to choose custom setup during the vista setup.

I'm not sure how the torrent based Vista will work for you. Vista has Windows Authentication which will time out the operating system after 30 days I think. I would just order a copy from newegg for $95 dollars and avoid the problems that might happen if Microsoft changes something. Security might become an issue if you are afraid to update the operating system.

 

[phoood]

I just want to insert something here.

If you bought a laptop, and it _did_ come with reinstallation cd's, then I would recommend installing that over your _ligit_ copy of windows.

Reason: Native hardware support. aka Drivers.
You can ignore my advice if you can find the right drivers your self.

Unless you just upgrade. imo, if your hp computer doesn't come with proprietary hardware, reinstall that shit. same goes with sony and any other computer that comes preinstalled with spyware.

edit-I found a tablet pc edition release floating around the interwebs. hint: ETH0