Vista question

[Indy89]

Just seen The new AR Vaio's on the site and am really tempted by the AR61ZU but was just wondering what peoples thoughts are on Vista, Ive heard a lot of fairly bad reviews on it and not too sure. What do people make of it in genral?

[tonybeard]

I have been using 32 and 64bit Vista since the RC versions were released at the begining of 2006. Overall the pros are purely based on appearence the cons are based on performance. In a nutshell if you want fast file transfer and bulletproof reliability but an ugly GUI stick with XP. If you like slick looking apppearence with more solid internet web interaction with better security (web construction) then Vista is for you. Vista has crashed more times than in my entire windows user timeline (15 years) and I was purely apple mac before that and can count on one hand the amount of times I have seen an Mac crash. When using a HDMI cable to an HD projector I find myself unplugging the cable to ensure I don't get a BSOD on startup despite reseting tcpip.sys numerous times and nothing detected in any diagnostic. This is because Vista is so RAM and graphic card intensive having a seperate monitor is just to much despite having the maximum 2 gig of RAM and a 256 meg Go 7600GT NVidia card. I can install XP but as a web developer find solace in the Vista platform security. Glutton for punishment....basically if you are a masochist go for Vista however the model you have pointed out runs a better front side bus speed and better chipsets with 3.5 gig (4 gig) of RAM possible so it may run better than my AR31S :smileygrin:

[kee-lo_]

I agree with Tony here, the performance of Vista is just an insult to your VAIO, as it can do a heck of a lot more with XP.

If you're planning to play games then Vista isn't really for you.

XP can do Blu Ray with PowerDVD and the only real thing you'll miss out on is... actually nothing, it's all glitz and graphically intensive.

If you know how, buy it, put XP on and enjoy

[Indy89]

Thanks for the replys much apreciated, sounds like vista is very much a waste of time. Most certainly glad i never put it on my AR21S now, which surprisingly hasnt crashed or caused me any trouble under XP MCE.
If I was to still go for the AR61ZU XP would have to be a must to put on it but just wondering were would I get a full set of drivers from for this laptop? Would it be possible for me to use my AR21S recovery discs? As the only thing I can see thats different and would possibly require new drivers is the graphics which is 8600 instead of 7600.

[kee-lo_]

Probably not, Sony only support Vista now, which is a shame.

As for the recovery disk, nope, it would put you back on Vista, you'd have to make your own image with something like Acronis TrueImage 10.

BTW one of the PC magazines is giving it away this month