Upgraded minime to Windows Vista

minime is the name of my laptop (see previous post). I have recently upgraded it from Windows XP to Windows Vista. At the time I got it, Windows Vista had not yet been released. However, part of the deal was that I would get a free upgrade (not including shipping) when Dell released their OEM version of Windows Vista.

To start things off, I made a complete backup of my laptop with a trial version of Norton Ghost. This was merely a precaution in case I wanted to go back to Windows XP. I saved the backup to an old 60GB external USB drive I bought in college. It took about 4 hours to make the complete backup.

After the backup, I ran a special CD from Dell that prepared the computer for the upgrade. It had to uninstall some of the programs that were known to be an issue with the upgrade. These apps would later be reinstalled by this process after the upgrade. Finally, the last thing left to do was to run the Windows Vista CD. This took at least 3 hours. I was pretty surprised on how long it took.

There were a few problems and tweaks I ran into after installing Vista:

• Had to uninstall and reinstall the network printer I share between my laptop and PC.
• Had to change the compatibility mode for some apps to Windows XP in order for them to run.
• Had to apply a special patch for Sonic Solutions DLA for it to run under Vista. This is the DVD software.
• Had to reinstall the touchpad software for the scroll to work.Had to reinstall Google Desktop for it to work.

I haven't had time to fully explore all the new stuff, but here's what I've liked so far:

• The side bar. Right now, I have Weatherbug, a meter that shows the usage of each core of the CPU and memory, stocks, network strength, a calculator, and a calendar in my side bar.
• The Flip 3D feature. This is a really cool way to switch between open programs. More about Flip 3D.
• The windows are semi-translucent.
• The desktop icons changed based on their contents (recycle bin, folders, etc.).
• Hovering your mouse over items in the task bar shows a preview of what it actually looks like.
• The task manager is much better and more granular. For instance, it shows the file image on the file system where the process was spawned from.

Another new thing is the Windows Experience Index. This is basically an analysis of your hardware and how well it conforms to the Vista operating system. This also allows software vendors to require a certain number in order to run their software. The score ranges from 1.0 to 5.9. Your score is equal to the lowest subscore. Mine is 3.6: